WHEKE TO FISH. 9 



resting amusement. If carried out on commercial principles, 

 it would probably pay as well as, or even better than, trout- 

 breeding, for there are many waters in England well adapted 

 for pike, but which, for the simple reason that no young 

 pike are to be bought, are being stocked with trout, with 

 very unsatisfactory results. Of course, in a trout-stream or 

 salmon-river pike should be unmercifully destroyed, or, better, 

 transported elsewhere; but in slow-flowing rivers, and in 

 weedy, reedy lakes, by all means preserve and increase the 

 breed of pike. 



I have already referred to some of the habits of pike, 

 particularly as to their voracity and food. Pike spawn early 

 in the year, the young fish earlier than those of larger size. 

 In some waters the time of spawning will be a month or 

 more sooner than in others. As a rule, pike lead a solitary 

 existence, only pairing for breeding purposes. The spawn 

 is deposited among weeds in ditches and quiet backwaters. 

 After this operation the fish return to the river vei-y lean 

 and hungry, and for a time feed most ravenously. They are 

 then easily caught, and their flesh is nasty and unwhole- 

 some — hence the wisdom of a close season. In the winter, pike 

 are sometimes found in shoals; but it would be more correct 

 to say that a number of solitary individuals have chosen one 

 spot for their abode, than that they have formed a shoal, the 

 surroundings, and not the society, bringing them together. 



The Hannts of Pike in rivers may be briefly described as 

 among weeds in or on the edge of the stream, in summer; 

 backwaters, eddies, and quiet places below islands, in winter. 

 In very small streams they will, as a rule, be found in the 

 deepest water all through the season, and every hole at a bend 

 may be expected to contain a fish. The best way by which I 

 can give my readers an idea of where they should fish for pike 

 in rivers, is to take them with me in a punt down some such 

 stream as that shown in my sketch (Fig. 2). It is not altogether 

 a fancy picture, but a combination of " pikey " bits of the Upper 

 Thames with which I am well acquainted. We will pay the 

 river two visits — one in August, the other in January — and will 

 thus be able to note the difference in the position of the fish in 



