[3] TROUT OPERATION'S ON m'cLOUD RIVER IN 1883. 1003 



This year several thousand young fish were reserved in the hatching 

 troughs after all the eggs had been sent off and 20,000 young try had 

 been turned into the river. These reserved fish were placed in a pond 

 by themselves and the experiment will be tried this year of raising 

 them. It will undoubtedly prove to be only an experiment this season, 

 as all the enemies to the young trout at this place and tlie difiiculties 

 to contend with here in raising them are not yet fully known, but it is 

 hoped that it will be a basis for successful operations in future seasons. 

 Next year, at all events, an elaborate effort will be made to raise a con- 

 siderable number. 



With a view to raising some breeders from the egg, and at the same 

 time to provide more room for those already in stock, new ijonds have 

 been built this year, and there is not much doubt that even a larger 

 number would be desirable, for, although the supply of water is very 

 large and of the best quality, it is probable that the breeders are still 

 too closely confined for maintaining perfectly favorable sanitary con- 

 ditions. 



The fishing for parent trout was continued this year, and probably 

 enough were caught to supply this year's waste in the i)ODds, caused 

 by the various adverse agencies to which trout are exposed, and whose 

 destructive character the trout breeder knows very well. 



The fishing was conducted this year on the same general plan as 

 heretofore, viz., by using set-lines stretched from one point to another 

 in the river, and furnished with lateral lines at suitable intervals, to 

 which are attached the hook and bait. These lateral lines extend to 

 the bottom of the river, for unlike eastern trout {Salvelinus fontinalis) 

 the McCloud Kiver trout {Salmo irideus) feed oft" the bottom of the 

 stream. Their method of looking for food is peculiar and wholly un- 

 like that of their eastern cousins. Every trout fisherman in the East- 

 ern States has noticed that the speckled fontinalis is always look- 

 ing upwards for food as if expecting, as he really does, that his food 

 will come from above. He is also generally evenly poised in the water 

 and sits in it like a well-trimmed ship on a quiet day at sea. The Cali- 

 fornia trout, on the contrary, roams about his watery hunting grounds 

 partly on his side with one eye directed to the bottom. He is quite as 

 dependent, and probably more so, upon the supply of food that is beneath 

 as for the supply that falls from above or floats on the surface. - Con- 

 sequently he spends as much of his time looking down for food as he 

 does looking up for it. He has another peculiarity also about feeding: 

 When he sees any food on the bottom that looks to him out of place, 

 or has from any cause a suspicious appearance, he wheels past it, and 

 as he passes the suspicious object he strikes it a vigorous blow with 

 his tail and then turns to observe its movements. If there appears to 

 be anything "crooked" about it he will not touch it, and will, aft(*r 

 striking it perhaps once or twice more with his tail, abandon it alto- 



