235 Roosevelt Wild Life Bulletin 



tion is one well said and should be emphasized. It should have been 

 "immediately applicable" or else the immediately applicable meas- 

 ure pertaining to lake trout should have been deferred to the future. 

 He says : " Go out after more knowledge. Nothing else will serve 

 as a basis of rational procedure. In all doubtful and difficult fish 

 cultural practices substitute carefully planned studies for random 

 obser^-ations and exact knowledge for hearsay. On every hand are 

 problems in fish production with the limiting factors unknown. The 

 cure for this condition is research." 



To the present writer, the remaining recommendations and dis- 

 cussions of them, seem to be to the point and sound, excepting in 

 one particular remark suggesting that the pike or pickerel is not a 

 valuable species. 



In Mr. Titcomb's introduction to these reports the recommenda- 

 tions, presumably derived from the individual reports, are as follows : 

 "' ' " I . That the planting methods for the distribution of lake trout 

 .be revised, and that they be planted as directed by the fish culturist. 



" 2. That the closed season on black bass be shortened so as to 

 close October 31st." 



3. [Pertains to protective patrol.] 



" 4. That the law for the protection of great northern pike or 

 ' pickerel ' be repealed. 



"5. That anglers kill all rock bass and sunfish when caught, and 

 if not utilized as food, take them ashore and bury them. 



" 6. That further efforts to stock the lake with landlocked salmon 

 be abandoned unless some provision is made to rear them up to 

 eight to ten inches in length." 



The present writer questions the wisdom of the recommended 

 repeal of the law concerning protection of the " great northern 

 pike " or " pickerel," especially since the recommendation appears 

 to be based upon general reputation and not wholly upon ascer- 

 tained facts. In his general recommendations in this same report, 

 Dr. Needham says : " Substitute carefully planned studies for ran- 

 dom observations and exact knoivledge for hearsay." (Italics the 

 present writer's.) Yet, Dr. Needham evidently concurs in the recom- 

 mendation, for which he gives the following reasons : 



" The northern pike (' pickerel ' of the local fisherman), is highly 

 prized by some ; but I have not included it among those I deem most 

 worthy of propagation because of its voracious fish-eating habits. 

 Early in life, certainly before the end of its first summer, it takes to 

 a diet of fishes, and through later life it eats hardly anything but 

 fishes ; and it is a prodigious quantity of fish that one pike can con- 

 sume in his time. The pike should probably hardly be considered an 

 enemy of the lake trout, and perhaps not even a serious competitor ; 

 for it keeps to surface haunts and hardly invades the foraging 

 grounds of the trout in deep water. But it certainly is both an 

 enemy and a competitor of the shore fishes : doubtless it eats mainly 



