168 REPORT OF ONTARIO GAME No. 52 



The Nipigon Forest Reserve. 



The Nipigon Forest Reserve stands unique among the provincial 

 parks in that it contains one of the finest and most beautiful sheets of 

 water in the Province, Lake Nipigon, and a river, the River Nipigon, 

 already world-famous for the grandeur of its waters, the magnificence 

 of its scenery, and the splendid trout angling that it affords. It is hardly 

 open to doubt that the advent of the Grand Trunk Pacific and Canadian 

 Northern railways into this region will result in an ever increasing 

 number of tourists visiting this reserve and taking advantage of its splen- 

 did angling. So important, indeed, from the point of view of the tourist 

 traffic are, and will continue to be, the trout fisheries of the River Nipi- 

 gon, and also, in fact, those of the rivers and streams flowing into Lake 

 Nipigon, that too great attention cannot Avell be paid to conserving and 

 maintaining them. 



There has unfortunately in the past been a considerable traffic in 

 the skins of large speckled trout taken from these waters. Both in certain 

 portions of Lake Nipigon and in the shoaler waters of the River Nipigon 

 the fish congregate thickly during the spawning season, and advantage 

 has been taken of this fact by Indians and others unlawfully to secure 

 quantities of large fish by placing nets on the spawning beds or by spear- 

 ing. The skin of a six to eight pound trout has commanded a compara- 

 tively high figure and the firms trading in the district have apparently 

 all of them been only too willing to purchase as many as they could get, 

 retailing them subsequently to the railways and others interested, or 

 even using them themselves, for advertising purposes, and also, it must 

 be confessed, selling them to certain of the visiting anglers whose prow- 

 ess or good fortune has been insufficient to gain for them the anticipated 

 trophy in the shape of a large trout, and who purchase the skin they 

 had hoped but failed themselves to secure. The number of fisli which 

 attain the maximum size must obviously be limited and it is apparent, 

 therefore, what an enormous number of trout of lesser size will be 

 slaughtered in the process of securing several hundred skins of speci- 

 mens of the largest dimensions, and it cannot be doubted that this traffic 

 has in some considerable measure been responsible for the diminishing 

 numbers of trout in these waters. In any case it is illegal to take the 

 fish by netting, and it is hardly to be doubted that the traffic in skins 

 is illegal also under the Order-in-Council forbidding the sale of speckled 

 trout in the Province of Ontario. However this may be, the traffic should 

 plainly be suppressed at once, for unfortunately it still continued to 

 some extent during the past season. 



A special license has to be obtained in order to angle in Lake Nipi- 

 gon, Nipigon River and adjacent waters, the charge for permanent 

 residents of Canada being |5.00 for two weeks and |10.00 for four 

 weeks, and for non-residents of Canada, |15.00 for two weeks or less, 

 $20.00 for three weeks and |25.00 for four weeks. Seeing that the 



