82 FLY FISHING AND SPINNING 



drops of rain are followed or accompanied by a rise ; this 

 rise may be produced by an upward movement of the 

 pupae in response to the meteorological influences at work. 

 Again, certain summer evenings, at about the same hour and 

 for a similar period, generally as the sun sets, will produce a 

 general rise ; this rise, so well known to fishermen, is, so far 

 as I can see, to be accounted for only by the cooler tempera- 

 ture inducing a general change from the pupal to the flying 

 state of certain small water insects ; these, as they ascend 

 to the surface, become clearly visible to the fish, which 

 follow them, and seize those which have not had time to 

 assume a flying condition. The fish are not, therefore, 

 feeding on flying insects. This evening carnival of the 

 trout is invariably accompanied by an enormous hatch of 

 small flying Ephemeridae, etc., probably those which are 

 missed by the trout and thus escape from the surface of the 

 water to which they have risen. Again and again have I 

 witnessed the water at such times fairly boiling with the 

 rising fish, but it has been seldom that I have had the 

 success of landing even as much as a brace of fish, though 

 after this excitement has subsided, the Coachman, Silver 

 Sedge, or Shaw's Fancy, have proved most deadly. 



There is no doubt that " bulging " is produced by the 

 activity of the sub-aqueous entomological life. 



The method by which the latest food taken by a trout 

 can be determined is by holding the trout in one hand, and, 

 with a firm upward pressure of the fingers of the other hand 

 along the lower sides of the abdomen of the fish towards the 

 gills, expressing, or forcing into the mouth, the latest food 

 swallowed by the trout, which may then be examined. 

 Should this pressure not succeed to the satisfaction of the 

 angler, the knife can be used to open the upper part of the 

 gullet or stomach, in order to discover of what this food 

 may happen to consist. 



