218 SALMONID^ OF BRITAIN. 



loch, and in many respects the finest fish of the -whole. The fry of all kinds are 

 "white in the flesh till they come to the size of a herring, about the beginning of 

 the third year. . . . Those called bull-trout are believed to'be the old ones. In 

 spring, 1791, a large one was caught that weighed ten lb." 



Dr. "Walker, in his posthumous Essays on Natural History and Bural Economy, 

 1812, observed of the trout in Loch Leven : — " The first most frequent is called at 

 the place Grey Trout, and is a fish not distinctly described by naturalists ; it is 

 found usually from one lb. to two lb. in weight, at times considerably larger. This 

 is supposed to be Salmo levenensis, N. The second, called by the inhabitants bull- 

 trout, Salmo taurinus, !N"., supposed to be a distinct species ; but there is reason to 

 suppose this is the male of the above. These two are generally known in Edinburgh 

 as Lochleven trout. The third is called at Kinross the Oamday, is eight in. to 

 ten in. long, and reckoned a distinct species : but is only the gray trout at an early 

 age." He likewise referred to three more species as the burn trout and the high- 

 land or muir trout ; and another form of bull trout, which he does not appear to 

 have seen, found in the deep parts of the lake, attaining to seven lb. or eight lb. in 

 weight, and with yellow flesh. 



Graham, General Review of the Agriculture of Kinross and ClacTcmannan, pub- 

 lished towards the commencement of the present century, after giving an account 

 of the Qsh found in Loch Leven, remarked, " Flounders are also found in Loch 

 Leven," which demonstrated that at this period sea-fishes were able to obtain 

 access up the river Leven into the lake. As the weirs, on the Severn passable 

 to Salmonidffi, shad, and eels, appear to be impassable to flounders, the ascent to 

 Loch Leven in those days could not have been very difficult. 



In the year 1874, Mr. R. Burns Begg, the ex-president of the Kinross Fishing 

 Club, compiled an interesting account of this fish, and of the locality which it 

 inhabited. The Lochleven lake, prior to 1830, covered a superficial area of 4312 

 acres ; it is situated 360 feet above the sea-level, and receives the waters of the 

 Gamy and the north and south Ineich ; while the mean flow from it throughout 

 the year amounts to 4000 cubic feet a minute, which goes into the river Leven, 

 and this river, after a course of fourteen miles, falls into the Firth of Forth. In 

 December, 1830, the loch was diminished to three-fourths of its original dimen- 

 sions, to 3543 acres, by an extensive drainage operation, which permanently 

 reduced its natural level to the extent of four-and-a-half feet, and means were like- 

 wise devised by which, when desired, another four-and-a-half feet can be drawn off.* 

 Fleming made a careful inspection of the loch during the years 1834 and 1835, in 

 order to ascertain what effect the drainage had had upon its fisheries, and he con- 

 cluded that they were permanently diminished one-third in their value ; the sluices 

 acting injuriously to young fish by the strong current at its outflow ; that the 

 margin of the lake had undergone a change unfavourable to its piscine inhabitants, 

 owing to the peculiar barrenness of the shore, rendering the new margin ill suited 

 for supplying them with food. But in the lake itself the water-snails were found 

 not to have been destroyed. 



Many have supposed that the superior flavour of Loch Leven troutf is a con- 

 sequence of the quality and abundance of the food which they could obtain there. 



* Dr. Gunther wrote in 1886 to the Secretary of the Glasgoto Trout Preservation Association, 

 Btating that there was a question, " Whether the celebrated Lochleven trout of old Scotch 

 naturalists is stiU in existence in its purity. If I recollect rightly Lochleven was, according to 

 the reports of the time, nearly depopulated some twenty years ago, and replenished with stock 

 taken from other localities " (October, 1886). The committee of the above association observed, 

 " This statement as to the mixing of the breed was a surprise to the committee, and on inquiry it 

 was discovered to have no foundation " (Report as to Stocking Loch Ard with Lochleven Trout, 

 1887, p. 7). Mr. David Marshall, of Kinross, remarked that " the date of the connection of the 

 late Mr. Campbell Marshall, my father, and myself as tacksmen of Loch Leven, begins with 1st 

 September, 1839, and ends with 1st September, 1874, and certainly no such piece of work was 

 done during those years. . . . and if anything had been done previously, we were sure to have 

 known it " (I. c. pp. 7, 8). 



t Whether tMs form is or is not Salmo Cumberland of Laodpfede, in his Histoire Naturelle des 

 Poissons, vol. v, p. 696, cannot now be determined from the meagre description which has been 

 handed down to us ; but that author described it as having a small head, white flesh, and being 

 externally of a gray colour. A correspondent of Loudon's Magazine of Natural History, vol. v, 



