An Angler's Paradise. 9 
took sixteen good from one lot of three boxes. It was quite easy 
to predict which were good the moment the lid was removed. The 
good ones had a green healthy look under the moss, and no fog 
under the lid; the bad ones had a fog, not unlike what I remember 
gossamer webs to be in the autumn mornings with a heavy dew ; 
the moss also was browner and sunk in the boxes, whereas the 
good boxes were light but full. 
‘“‘T believe the kind of moss has much to do with it. The 
brown moss had a good deal of old grass and sticks amongst it, 
as if taken from woods; but the good was more like what grows 
on the boles of trees and about sluice gates. I could see no sign 
of eyes in most of the ova, but in some the fish were plainly to be 
observed. I feared therefore at first, for a few days, that many 
were unfertile, but this morning I see the eyes in many more, and 
the deaths are far less. No doubt the warmer temperature is 
beginning to tell. You will be anxious to know how many are 
likely to survive. I can only give a rude guess, but from the look 
I should think there are not more than from fifteen to twenty 
thousand left, but many of these will of course come to nothing ;. 
if we hatch from six to ten thousand I shall consider we have 
done well.” 
It is plain from these extracts that in 1873 the work in New 
Zealand was being carried on under considerable difficulties. Let. 
us now look at the state of things out there ten years later (1883), 
and we find that trout are thoroughly acclimatized, and are being 
cultivated in many places. Amongst other cases is one mentioned 
in the Otago Daily Times about this time, which gives the follow- 
ing account of Mr. W. S. Pillans, of Otago, who had successfully 
raised some six thousand trout of his own :— 
“This gentleman’s property, known as Manuka Island Sta- 
tion, is situated a few miles from Balclutha, near the bank of the 
river. It boasts no natural advantages for pisciculture, and what 
has been done has been done by hard and persevering work. The 
number quoted (six thousand) does not, however, by any means, 
sum up the extent of Mr. Pillans’ operations so far. He has, it is 
said, given a quantity of fry to the Acclimatization Society, and 
exclusive of these, he has now at his nursery fifty-seven thousand 
ova in course of hatching, six thousand yearlings, and nearly two 
