THE DACE 



LEUCISCUS VULGARIS 

 German, Der Hasling; French, Vendoise or Dard 



By R. B. MARSTON 



HIS lively, silvery fish is caught with all the baits and with the 

 same tackle and methods as the roach. It has the excellent habit 

 of rising freely at the fly — natural or artificial — and is fished for 

 exactly as in fly-fishing for trout. I have taken as many as a 

 hundred dace in a day with the dry fly — using a double hook 

 midge, as the dace has a way of ejecting a fly more quickly 

 than any trout can do it, and the little double hook is much less easily 

 got rid of in that way. Fly-fishing for dace is very good fun, especially 

 when they run large, as they do in the Kennet, where fish of half a pound 

 are common, and specimens of a pound or more are not very rare; one 

 and a half pounds is probably the record. I am not sure that I have ever 

 seen one quite that size. As a bait for a pike there is nothing, as a rule, 

 better than a lively dace, as its silvery sides flash with its movements, 

 and catch the pike's eye. The dace spawns in April and May, when it 

 collects in great numbers on the shallows. 



DACE. 



258 



