1 88 THE PIKE 



therefore appreciate the obvious duties which they 

 owed to their riparian neighbours, have by their 

 indifference caused the ruin of a trout water. Then, 

 again, there are owners of fishing rights who adopt 

 only half measures in dealing with the evil influences. 

 A certain amount of netting may be done, but the 

 work is frequently set about in a very rudimentary 

 manner, and left to someone who knows next to 

 nothing about practical netting, and cares less about 

 the results. 



The possibility of pike and coarse fish finding 

 their way into trout waters is ever present to the 

 preserver, but his fishery is specially vulnerable in 

 the pike's spawning season, for, when these fish run 

 up into the ditches and carriers for that purpose, they 

 are not unlikely to escape the keeper's vigilant eye. 

 A future generation of pike may be thus easily 

 introduced quite unseen ; and when it is stated that 

 a female pike is computed to shed 10,000 ova to 

 every pound of her weight, the serious injury which 

 may be inflicted is laid bare. Mr. Valentine Corrie 

 informs me that on the upper waters of the Itchen the 

 present foul state of some of the lower-lying ditches 

 and carriers used by the farmers for irrigating their 

 meadow land has become a fisherman's grievance, as, 

 when half choked with weeds and rushes, they provide 



