THE BASSES: FRES H w ATER AND MARINE 



the fish to see them. Even catfish and suckers 

 have fallen a prey to the artificial fly. 



I do not claim that black bass will take the arti- 

 ficial fly in preference to. the spinner or natural 

 baits, although I have known instances where they 

 did so. I simply say to all doubters that if fished 

 for under the proper conditions, the bass can be 

 taken with the feathers with more or less success 

 in all its native waters. Difference in habitat will 

 affect measurably, and in limited instances, the 

 habits of fish, their hours of feeding, action when 

 hooked, coloration, and (even to a slight degree) 

 their physical structure; but a hungry bass in any 

 water will seize a moving lure if in its action it 

 approaches that of a living creature. 



Choice of Flies 



As to the choice of flies, no list would satis i ? y 

 the craft at large. Anglers are markedly divided 

 into two classes the colorists and the formal- 

 ists. The first have an intense belief in the color- 

 dressing of a fly, and some of them go so far as 

 to swear by the minutest and almost obscure tints 

 on the tip of the wing or on the hackles. The 

 formalists, on the other hand, discard color as 

 of little value in luring, but insist on form and 

 manner in dressing. They argue for and believe 

 in either large-winged, small-winged, or cocked- 



50 



