s »i REPORT OF STATE BOARD OF FISH COMMISSIONKKS. 



With the general characteristics of the Kern River trout, Salmo gil- 

 berti, Prom which these dainty fishes are plainly descended, the Golden 

 trout has the body largely golden-yellow, with a scarlet stripe along the 

 middle of the side, while the lower fins are bright orange. There is a 

 white dash on the front of the dorsal fin, as in Salmo gilberti. The 

 scales are equally small, one hundred and sixty to one hundred and 

 eighty in a lengthwise series, and they are so little developed that they 

 scarcely overlap. 



The Golden trout rarely reach a foot in length. They are extremely 

 gamy, taking the fly or the bait with the greatest readiness. They are 

 hence in imminent danger of utter extermination, because the trout- 

 hog, the most vulgar of all beasts of prey, has already invaded the 

 Kern Valley, and boasts of his great catches of this unsuspecting and 

 defenseless little trout. Only yesterday I heard of one assemblage of 

 cads from San Francisco who caught six hundred in one afternoon, 

 leaving four hundred and fifty tying on the bank. Two other idiots at 

 the same time caught two hundred in an afternoon. 



The interest attached to this wonderful trout, interesting alike to the 

 angler, the artist and the man of science, led President Roosevelt to 

 arrange for a complete exploration of its haunts. In 1904, B. "W. Ever- 

 mann, of the Bureau of Fisheries, Professors 0. P. Jenkins and R. L. 

 Green, of Stanford University, and Professor Juday, of the University 

 of Chauncy, Colorado, with volunteer and other assistants, made a 

 complete survey of the waters inhabited by the Golden trout. The 

 report of this work is not yet published, but it is understood that 

 besides the original species of Golden trout, two others equally beautiful 

 were found, each isolated in a particular stream at the head of Kern 

 River, each being shut off from the main body of Kern River trout 

 by a waterfall. 



How these fishes came to be above the waterfall no one knows. For 

 in the Sierras, as in the mountains generally, there are no fish above 

 the falls until some man helps them up. Indians do not often do 

 this. Volcanic or earthquake disturbances create dams and change 

 currents. They may make in time a cataract out of a rapid. Anyhow, 

 these exquisite trout are found above the falls, and while there they 

 have changed their color to match the bottom over which they live. 



How do they do this? We know of only one way, and that is not 

 yet proved. We suppose that the scarlet, orange and golden colors of 

 the rocks below were transferred to the trout by natural selection. 

 These tributaries of the Kern at timber line are shallow, open and 

 exposed to the attacks of kingfishers, fishhawks, fishducks and the like 

 birds which are fond of little fishes, and which know how to capture 

 them. Any trout brought into exposed water turns pale as compared 

 with his colors in a dark pool. This is not a real change in color, but 



