4 BRITISH SPORTING FISHES. 



dreaded disease makes its appearance. This 

 shows as a white fungus about the head and 

 shoulders, and gradually spreads until the fish 

 sickens and dies. Hardly anything is known 

 about the disease, except that it is infectious. 

 Newly-run salmon that come in contact with 

 affected fish soon develop it ; and when once it 

 breaks out, there is scarcely an individual but 

 what shows signs of the fungus. Spates and 

 floods tend to eradicate it, and these alone. 



An interesting fact anent salmon is that they 

 produce hybrids with other fish. They breed 

 freely with brown-trout, brook-trout, also those 

 peculiar to Loch Leven ; and this is the more 

 remarkable as the offspring from this cross 

 in no wise sacrifice their fertility. That salmon 

 and trout are commonly found on the same 

 " redd " has long been known to poachers, though 

 scientists have only admitted the fact recently. 

 Here is an actual incident. Upon one occasion 

 a poacher found a freshly-run male salmon watch- 

 ing over a female, the former of which he gaffed. 

 Knowing that a second suitor would soon take 

 the place of the first, he allowed the she-fish to 

 remain. A second male attended her, a third, 

 and a fourth, she starting down-stream each time 

 her lord was taken. Upon her fifth return she 

 brought back a large yellow trout, and so much 



