FISH IN FOREST STREAMS AND LAKES 



BY R. W. SHUFELDT 



(PHOTOGRAPHS BY THE AUTHOR) 



WERE it not for our forests there would not be 

 many fresh water fish or to carry the illustra- 

 tion further, if our forests disappear, so will, in 

 large part, those fine streams which fish frequent and 

 fishermen love. The subject of recreation in our forests, 

 which is coming more and more to the fore, includes 

 fishing, and this article is written to give some account 

 of some of the fish which are caught in streams that 

 run for miles through 

 forest areas, or in lakes 

 and ponds located in the 

 very depths of timbered 

 country. Beyond a brief 

 description of the Striped 

 Bass, which runs far up 

 some of our larger rivers 

 to spawn, no mention of 

 marine fishes will be made 

 here; of these there are 

 many hundreds of kinds 

 inhabiting the coastwise 

 waters of the Atlantic and 

 Pacific Oceans, as well as 

 the Gulf of Mexico. The 

 writer has caught many 

 of these all the way 

 around the coast line 

 from Long Island Sound 

 to Galveston Harbor, 

 Texas. But they do not 

 interest the lover of the 

 forest, while an account 

 of our trout, our pikes or 

 pickerel, our catfishes, 

 basses, and others that he 

 knows more or less about 

 from having taken them 

 and handled them himself, 

 would naturally appeal to 

 him. 



With but few excep- 

 tions, all of our fresh- 

 water fishes are repre- 

 sented by several species making up any particular genus ; 

 for example, the catfishes, sunfishes, and trout all illus- 

 trate this fact, as well as the herring group and others 

 that do not particularly interest us here. Dr. David 

 Starr Jordan, our greatest authority on American fishes, 

 long ago published the fact that "the catfishes abound 

 in all the fresh waters of the United States east of the 

 Rocky Mountains. The species of the three genera, 

 Channel Cats, Horned Pout, and Mud Cats, which con- 

 stitute the bulk of the family as represented in North 



FOREST LOVERS IN CAMP 



Figure 1. Evening on the borders of an Adirondack Lake with a mess of fish 



for dinner. 



America, all reach a length of from one to five feet, and 

 all are food fishes of more or less importance. One of 

 the Catfishes, the Mississippi Cat, is our largest fresh- 

 water fish, weighing upwards of one hundred and fifty 

 pounds; and two of the others, the Mud Cat and the 

 Great Lake Catfish, reach a very considerable size." In 

 quoting this paragraph, the liberty of substituting the 

 common names for the scientific ones has been taken. 



Our "Bull-head" is the 

 best known species of the 

 family, and it is the com- 

 mon form of cat of the 

 New England and North- 

 ern States. Many know 

 it as the "Bull-pout," 

 "Horned Pout," and 

 sometimes as the "Minis- 

 ter." A number of years 

 ago they were successfully 

 introduced into the rivers 

 of California, where they 

 are now quite abundant; 

 an excellent picture of 

 one is here produced in 

 Figure 3. 



It is great sport to fish 

 for catfish on a rainy 

 night, using small pieces 

 of raw beef for bait, 

 scented with a drop or so 

 of the tincture of assa- 

 foetida to attract them. 

 Among the water-lilies is 

 a great place to try it a 

 barqboo pole and line is 

 all the rig necessary ; but 

 to keep dry, one should 

 be dressed in rubber from 

 head to foot. When the 

 catch runs at three or 

 four pounds to the take 

 to get a good mess does 

 not carry one very far 

 into the night; and if properly cooked over the camp- 

 fire, they are more palatable than some people represent 

 them to be. 



Speaking of catfish, a great place to fish for them is in 

 any suitable locality in the Potomac River (Fig. 4) ; 

 indeed, that stream is noted for the great variety of 

 fishes that are indigenous to it. Among others may be 

 mentioned two or three species of sunfishes (Figs. 6 

 and 7) ; white and yellow perches ; black bass ; striped 

 bass, and shad in the spawning season ; crappie, eels, 



us 



