SMALL FRY 

 to mice, as they run up and down the woodwork and piles of old timber 

 bridges, and among the stones. They make a nest somewhat as the stickle- 

 back does, only it is a hole scooped out under a stone, Mr Regan says, in 

 which about 1,000 largish eggs are laid, and the male watches the little 

 clump of adhesive eggs and fry for about a month, driving off intruders. 

 Buckland calls it the chameleon of fishes, as it changes its colour so 

 much; sometimes it is yellow, then brown, orange, emerald green, etc. 

 It is, as I know from experience, a good bait for eels and trout; its 

 broad head is armed with sharp spines as points to the gill -covers, 

 and kingfishers, grebe, and other fish-eating birds occasionally get 

 choked in attempting to swallow a miller's thumb — only a week or two 

 ago a friend told me he had found a dab chick in the River Chess choked 

 by a small one. 



THE LOACH OR STONE-LOACH 



NEMA CHILUS BARB A TULA 

 German, Die schmerle; French, Locke 



The loach is chiefly of importance to the angler as a bait for other fish, 

 especially for trout and salmon. In Ireland Collaugh* ruadh (red-hag), 

 i.e., stone loach, used to be, and in some districts is still, considered 

 the most deadly bait for the big trout of the big Irish lakes, and for the 

 big salmon of the Shannon. I know anglers who use the loach with great 

 success in place of the sand-eel in spinning for salmon on the Wye — ^which 

 is now such a grand salmon angling river, thanks to its splendid manage- 

 ment in recent years. 



The loach spawns in April or May. Mr Regan quotes an interesting 

 account of the operations. There are two kinds of loach in this country: 

 the stone loach and the spined loach — they are almost identical in shape; 

 the spined loach (Cobitis t<ema) has two sharp little spines which lie 

 in grooves below the eyes. In the Isle of Wight Mr Percy Wadham 

 discovered, I think, that they have only the spined loach. Perhaps the 

 best way to spin a loach is to have a hollow metal spinning head, as on 

 the Phantom. 



*In Ireland one of the names of the toach is coUey. 



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