Food of the Yclloivstonc Trout 491 



HINTS TO ANGLERS IN YELLOWSTONE PARK 



Your Attitude. — In older days man hunted because he required 

 food. Modern conditions have supplanted hunting by the domestic 

 breeding of animals, so that a sufficient food supply is at hand. More- 

 over, agriculture has encroached on nature's fastnesses to an extent 

 that these cannot possibly propagate a sufficient food supply in the 

 natural state. The hunting instinct, engendered because of neces- 

 sity for so many generations, must naturally be slow to die out. So 

 man still loves to hunt, be it big game, fish — ■ for fishing is but hunt- 

 ing in the water, — flowers, or little game, such as insects and still 

 smaller things. For years hunters have realized that game is getting 

 scarce, that it is more difficult to stalk, and that the cost of hunting 

 is fast increasing. But because there is no longer any real necessity 

 for hunting, it follows that our inherited attitude should be modified 

 to conform to the new conditions. This change is already evidenced 

 in the attitude of the conservationists, of the nature lovers, and of 

 sportsmen. 



What is a sportsman? The popular and correct idea of such a 

 man is that he hunts for the pleasure of the hunt, for the thrills he 

 receives in pitting his ingenuity against that of the quarry he seeks. 

 He possesses discrimination ; he does not kill wantonly, he does not 

 slaughter, he is moderate in the amount of game he hunts. He is not 

 cruel, but kills his catch at once and does not let it suffer needlessly. 

 His bag is made up of choice specimens rather than of many ; he 

 seeks quality, not quantity. He will not countenance " mass killing," 

 as in the case of dynamiting streams or even catching the legal limit 

 when that is obviously too high. He is eminently a man who believes 

 in the " square deal," for himself, for others, for the things he hunts. 

 A splendid ideal, this synthetic conception of the sportsman ! And he 

 is not a phantasm, but a reality ; he is made up of you and me, of the 

 best that is in all of us. 



Fishing is the one type of hunting that is still available to all of us, 

 and the only kind that can possibly be allowed in our National Parks. 

 Big game and wild life of all kinds are becoming more and more 

 restricted to natural strongholds, some of them difficult to reach. But 

 fish ! They travel in the waters that pass our very doorsteps. Thus 

 a source of both food and pleasure is easily available. Fish as a 

 reserve food supply are unfortunately too little esteemed. Few 

 people, even well informed citizens, realize and appreciate the food 

 resources of the waters in the United States. Generally, people 



