22 FISH- CULTURAL ASSOCIATION. 
eo 
I say about their becoming soft I have learned partly by ex- 
perience and partly by what several fishermen have told me. 
One gentleman wrote that they were like dried herrings when 
he got home. Our gentleman don’t think much of this, anda 
year or so more passes along, when he invites a friend out to 
his preserve on the opening day of brook trout fishing, and 
they have plenty of sport, fish are plenty and perfectly willing 
to bite, but, confound it, they are almost all rainbow trout, and 
must be returned to the stream, as the law on them is not off 
for a month or more yet! Our friend works hard and long for 
a string of brook trout such as he could formerly take in a 
short time before introducing the rainbows. Now, gentlemen, 
if this suppositious case proves true, is it advisable to put them 
into your fine trout streams? It is proving itself to be true as 
fast as possible in one of the best trout streams in the State 
of New York, that has been stocked some four years, I believe, 
with rainbow trout. 
A word to fish-culturists. Will it pay to make any great 
outlay, until we know that the rainbow trout are a profitable 
fish? And another question is, are they a good market fish? 
They certainly are not if they become soft very soon after com- 
ing from the water. What will the market price be? Will the 
fly-fisherman show his basket of mountain trout with the same 
pride, as he did when filled with the native brook trout, are 
also questions to be answered. 
I know one fisherman that will not put one of them into his 
basket, but throws all of them away, and it has seemed to me 
that it will dono harm to consider well the questions here raised 
before we stock our brooks witha fish which may exterminate 
our native species, and not prove to be so valuable in the end. 
The Presipent.—Mr. Annin has opened a question which it 
may be worth our while to consider. Perhaps it will be well to 
learn more of this fish before filling our streams with it. I 
would suggest that Mr. Mather give us his opinion on it. 
Mr. Maruer.—I have had no personal experience with the 
rainbow, or, as it is sometimes called, the California mountain 
