CHAPTER II. 

 PONDS. 



THE first questions you will ask yourself, when 

 you have decided that you have suitable water 

 for your purposes, are, where shall the ponds be located, 

 at what points on the stream shall the ponds be built, 

 and how shall they be constructed ? 



In answering these inquiries, a great variety of con- 

 siderations of a special character will come in, such 

 as the nature of the soil, the lay of the land, and your 

 personal tastes, which you can best settle for yourself 

 without help ; but there are other considerations of a 

 general character which should be noticed here, and 

 among them are the following. 



i. The water you have is to be used for three dis- 

 tinct purposes, — for the hatching apparatus, for the 

 nursery, and for the ponds of the mature trout, — and 

 it should be borne in mind that the water which may 

 be good for one of these may not be good for another. 



For instance, the cold, barren water, just emerging 

 from the earth, though just the thing for hatching 

 eggs, is, from its cold and unnutritious character, poor 

 Water to fatten mature fish in ; on the other hand, 

 brook-water, full of animal life, which is just the thing 

 on that account for the mature trout, may, from its 



