CHAPTER XVI 

 SALMON FLIES, KNOTS, GUT, AXIOMS, ETC. 



Salmon flies List of flies Hooks Flexible eyes Metal eyes knots 

 Useful axioms and hints when fishing. 



The salmon can by no means be classed as the lowest of 

 its order in the scale of the vertebrata, and, quite apart from 

 instinct, memory influences to a greater or less degree the 

 life of every vertebrate ; this may explain why a salmon 

 will allow certain flies to pass by unmolested, but will, with- 

 out hesitation, attack a different coloured or a different sized 

 fly. 



It is, I think, generally agreed that fish are able to dis- 

 tinguish colours and tones. In every salmon river, there 

 are certain flies which are tried over and over again by the 

 fisherman as being the ones most likely to succeed, and the 

 salmon, after being some time in fresh water, will naturally 

 remember the size and the colour of the nasty prickly things 

 by which it has so frequently been startled, and however 

 much its instinct might compel the destruction of moving 

 aqueous life, it as a consequence of its former experience 

 will be unlikely to tackle these particular flies. I think it 

 is important therefore, as the season advances, or some time 

 after a run of clean fish has ceased, to try flies other than the 

 popular few. 



Those whose water is so situated as to give them the first 

 chance at fish as they enter a river may, with every possi- 

 bility of success, content themselves with some ten or more 

 flies, say the Thunder and Lightning, the Black Doctor, 



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