62 WILD SPORTS OF THE WEST. 



Although in this water angling may be considered 

 as ending in September, yet, through the succeeding 

 months till spring, the fish rise freely at a fly. But the 

 sport is very indifferent compared with summer angling ; 

 the salmon now has lost his energy ; he struggles 

 laboriously to get away, but his play is different from 

 the gallant resistance he would have offered had you 

 hooked him in July. I have landed and turned out 

 again as many as nine salmon in one day, and their 

 united exertions did not afford me half the amusement 

 I have received from the conquest of one sprightly 

 summer fish. Salmon appear to lose beauty and energy 

 together. They are now reddish, dull, dark-spotted, 

 perch-coloured fish, and seem a different species from 

 the sparkling silvery creature we saw them when they 

 first left the sea. As an esculent, they are utterly 

 worthless soft, flabby and flavourless, if brought to 

 table ; and, instead of the delicate pink hue they 

 exhibited when in condition, they present a sickly, 

 unhealthy, white appearance, that betrays how complete 

 the change is that they have recently undergone. 



And yet at this period they suffer mostly from night- 

 fishers. This species of poaching* is as difficult to 

 detect as it is ruinous in its consequences. It is believed 

 that the destruction of a few breeding fish may cost the 

 proprietor one thousand ; such being the astonishing 

 fecundity of the pregnant salmon ! 



Night fishing is carried on when the river is low, 

 and the night moonless. The poacher, with a gaff and 



* " "When I made the tour of that hospitable kingdom in 1754, it 

 (the Coleraine fishery) was rented by a neighbouring gentleman for 

 620 a year, who assured me that the tenant, his predecessor, gave 

 for it 1,600 per annum and that he was a greater gainer by the 

 bargain, on account of the number of poachers who destroy the fish 

 during the fence month." Pennant. 



