MATTER OF EQUIPMENT 11 



ably expert with either the dry or the wet fly, 

 employing one or the other as conditions war- 

 rant or the occasion renders imperative. Dry 

 fly fishing conditions here and in England are 

 quite dissimilar. The English dry fly specialist 

 follows his sport, in general, upon the gin-clear, 

 quiet chalk streams; slow, placid rivers, pre- 

 served waters artificially stocked with brown 

 trout (Salmo fario), and hard-fished by the 

 owners or lessees. 



The open season is a long one, extending, 

 taking an average, from early in the spring, 

 about the first of March, to the first of Octo- 

 ber; and as a consequence of the steady and 

 hard fishing the trout naturally become very 

 shy and sophisticated. Owing to the placidity 

 of the streams the rise of a trout is not difficult 

 to detect, and it seems to pay best to cast to a 

 single trout actually known to be on the rise 

 and feeding rather than to fish all the water on 

 the principle of chuck-and-chance-it. 



On the other hand, the American fly-caster 

 largely enjoys his sport upon the trout streams 

 of the woods or wilderness; erratic rivers with 

 current alternating between swift and slow, 

 broken water and smooth, rapid and waterfall, 

 deep pool and shallow riffle. While insect life 

 is not, of course, absent, one can actually fol- 



