WET FLY FISHING, ETC. 125 



sometimes contains worm-like parasites of microscopic 

 character. These attach themselves to a portion of the 

 fungus near the skin of the trout, and are continually 

 eating into the tissue of the fish. The mouths of these 

 worms are armed with tentacles, with which they can 

 adhere to any portion of the trout's skin which may be 

 unprotected by slime.* 



If the worms be killed by salt solution, the fungus then 

 disappears. If, however, any portion of the living and 

 malignant fungus be returned to the water, it will carry 

 with it a percentage of these deadly and contagious worms ; 

 hence the necessity of its destruction to insure the protec- 

 tion of the healthy trout in the same stream. The bare 

 places caused by the fry nibbling one another are an ever- 

 present source of danger to these small fish. 



HINTS AS TO THE SELECTION OF THE FLY WHEN BY THE 



WATER-SIDE 



So long as the fisherman has from eight to twelve of each 

 of the flies which are likely to be on the water which he is 

 going to fish, his only difficulty will then be the determina- 

 tion of which fly to use. When he reaches the river, he 

 should as soon as possible find out which fly is being 

 taken. 



It is just here that the utility of a small, light, and collap- 

 sible butterfly net must be again emphasized ; no article, 

 after the rod, the line and flies, the reel and the fishing-net, 

 is more important to the dry fly fisherman. It is always 

 difficult, and often impossible, to catch the elusive winged 

 insects which are flying or floating rapidly past without such 

 a net. With a net, however, little or no time is lost, and 

 fly after fly can be easily and quickly netted and examined 

 and then compared with the artificial flies in the student's 



* See Black fish, page 43. 



