THE GRAYLING 



Like most other salmonoid fish, grayling observe no standard of dimen- 

 sion, their weight and size depending on the abundance of food. As shown 

 above, the largest grayling taken during sixty-eight years by a member 

 of the Stockbridge Club weighed 3 lb. 10 oz. when unseasonable. Dr 

 Day has registered the capture of one weighing 5^ lb. " in a trap at 

 the top of the Camlet in Shropshire."* This was in the spring of 1887, 

 and, if authentic, constitutes the record weight for British grayling; but 

 one has to remember that few things require stricter verification than the 

 dimensions of individual fish. 



Izaak Walton's opinion that the grayling ** is not so general a fish as 

 the trout, nor — ^to me — so good to eat or to angle for," must have been 

 founded upon grayling caught in summer. Perhaps he never tasted, 

 because likely he never caught, an October grayling, for all his pages are 

 redolent of mayblossom and the fiower of beans; one cannot imagine him 

 seeking the riverside when song birds are mute and the woodland is sere. 



Hear him in ** The Angler's Wish ": 



I in these flowery meads would be : 

 These crystal streams should solace me : 

 To whose harmonious bubbling noise 

 I with my angle would rejoice : 

 Sit here and see the turtle-dove 

 Court his chaste mate to acts of love. 



Or, on that bank feel the west wind 

 Breathe health and plenty: please my mind 

 To see sweet dew-drops kiss these flowers, 

 And then washed off by April showers 



• •••••••• 



Or, with my Bryan and a book. 

 Loiter long days by Shawford brook. 



No wonder that Walton thought poorly of the esculent quality of gray- 

 ling if he judged only by those caught when he could command the acces- 

 sory delights of " flowery meads " and ** sweet dew-drops," for in its 

 season of courtship this dainty fish coincides with the turtle-dove. Izaak, 

 who was more of a poet than a naturalist, seems not to have been aware 

 of this, for he writes of the grayling as " a fish that lurks close all winter, 

 but is very pleasant and jolly after mid -April [when it is spawning] and in 

 May and in the hot months." To my taste the firmly flaked, white flesh 



* British and Irish Salmanid^, p. 286. 



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