500 MY GARDEN. 



prized by the miller's- thumb, stickleback, or even by a trout of larger 

 dimensions. 



When a number of small fish are thus turned out, they gradually 

 seem to drop down the stream, and may be traced for some hundred 

 yards. At the period of losing the umbilical vesicle the fish are delicate, 

 and I have known as many as two thousand fine young salmon-trout 

 die in a single night, from some cause which I could not satisfactorily 

 explain. 



When it is desired to feed trout artificially till they attain a large 

 size, live fish are required. At Heidelberg, where there is a breeding 

 establishment on a slender stream at the Wolfsgang, I saw great 

 quantities of white fish, which were procured by netting the river Neckar 

 below. The difficulty of obtaining a sufficient supply of such fish would 

 prevent me from making trout-feeding a profitable business, as it 

 appears to be at Heidelberg ; for how could I possibly procure a 

 constant and cheap supply of live minnows, bleak, dace, or other fish 

 at my garden, where none now naturally exist ? The kindness and 

 courtesy of the officials at the Huningue establishment of France 

 merit the warmest acknowledgments of pisciculturists, and I have to 

 return them my thanks for many boxes of spawn. The practical success 

 of this process is proved by the fact that many varieties of trout are now 

 found in my water which did not exist in the Wandle before I supplied 

 the river from ova sent to me by this establishment. It is understood 

 amongst the proprietors of the Wandle that fly-fishing should alone be 

 practised for catching trout. There are one or two pieces of waste 

 water, however, where the fish are sadly poached. It is not usual to 

 fish before the 1st of May or later than the end of August. In 

 some years the fish are hardly fit to eat in May, and in others become 

 so thin by the middle of August as to be unfit for food. 



Fish out of season shrivel in cooking, are tasteless, and are some- 

 - times actually poisonous, for which reason every black fish, when 

 caught by a rod and line, should be returned to the river. 



Every fisherman has his peculiar notions as to the size and colour 

 -of the flies he uses, and even of the number which he has on his line. 



