MINNOW AND PARR-TAIL FISHING 161 



great size, and may be more readily taken by the 

 minnow than by any other means ; but these over- 

 grown specimens are generally not inviting. 



The value of the minnow, however, as a lure for 

 trout is to some extent lessened by the difficulty of 

 procuring them. In places and circumstances most 

 favourable to their use, it is sometimes impossible 

 to get them, and we have frequently found the cap- 

 ture of minnows much more difficult than the 

 capture of the trout when we had got them ; their 

 capture, therefore, becomes an object of primary 

 consideration. 



Minnows are not easily caught till April, as it is 

 not till the streams are in some measure reduced 

 that they venture out from under the banks and 

 other places where they have sheltered themselves 

 from the torrents of winter. In most of the streams 

 in the South of Scotland they are to be found in 

 abundance from April to November. They frequent 

 the thin edges of pools, and every place where a 

 turn of the river leaves a corner, or as it is called 

 " back water," where they can swim unmolested ; 

 and in a sunny day such places may be seen almost 

 black with them. 



A great many different contrivances are employed 

 to capture them. The small pout or landing-net 

 may be used very effectively during the time of a 

 flood, and it should be worked with the current 

 about the edges of places which the minnows are 

 known to frequent, and in back water. It may also 

 be employed when a shoal of minnows is found in 



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