43° 



RECREATION 



there are hotels or stopping places, so that 

 the fisherman need not go into camp unless 

 he so desires. 



1 More remote from civilization, and con- 

 sequently less accessible, are the salmon rivers 

 of the south shore, comprising those flowing 

 into Fortune Bay, and the Little, White Bear, 

 Grandy and La Poile Rivers. 



The northern rivers are only to be reached 

 by the Newfoundland -Company's fortnightly 

 steamers, or else by yacht. They are, natural- 

 ly, very little fished and may be recommended 

 when the more accessible rivers shall be over- 

 crowded, but at present this is not the case, 

 nor is it likely to be true for another gener- 

 ation. 



There is more wading to be done in New- 

 foundland than in the mainland rivers, as 

 they are small and rocky, generally, and often 

 unfitted for canoeing. 



The season in Newfoundland is from June 

 5th to September 15th, but the best fishing 

 is previous to August 1st. 



HOW TO FISH. 



Salmon fishing differs so much from trout 

 fishing that it has been said an absolute 

 beginner at fly fishing will learn to take 

 Salmo salar, more readily than will a trout 

 fisherman who tries the nobler fish, after 

 years of practice with the smaller one. 

 This I doubt, but I know that a very differ- 

 ent style of fishing is needed. There is 

 really no such thing as "striking" in salmon 

 fishing, and if you keep a tight line and 

 raise your rod as soon as you feel the 

 "pluck" of the fish, you will be doing your 

 whole duty, and it will be up to the fish to 

 do the rest. There is no occasion for the 

 swift strike by which one hooks a shy trout 

 inclined to, rise a trifle short. The salmon 

 is such a weighty fellow, that when he turns 

 to, go*; down after taking the fly> his momen- 

 tum drives the hook in above the barb, with 

 very little assistance on the part of the 

 angler, provided the line be fairly taut. 



A salmon pool may be of any shape and 

 form ; sometimes it is not a pool, but mere- 

 ly a "lie" behind a ledge or a boulder, but 

 it is. never very deep. As a rule, a fish will 

 not rise to a fly, through more than six feet 

 of* water, and perchance a capital pool may 

 not be more than three feet deep. 



Thk^angler. should- begin at the head of 

 the pool with a line less than twice the length 

 of the rod, casting across, and diagonally 

 downstream, and allowing the fly -to sweep 

 around, working the rod. tip, from across to 

 doy&ijstfeam at the. end,; of the. cast. The. 

 most fatal moment is just as the. fly. swings 

 round) to. assume, a position directly down- 

 stream, of the angler. The fly may be worked 

 slightly as it swings, and also for a second 

 or two after it has reached the end of its 

 course. Then, if no rise has happened, the 



line should be lengthened by a foot o~ two 

 and the cast repeated, these proceedings, 

 eventually, resulting in one of three things : 

 a rise; the pool being fished out; or as much 

 water covered as the angler can manage 

 without shifting his stand. 



With a canoe at command the proceeding 

 is more simple. The fisherman begins with 

 a very short cast, and when he has a line 

 out not longer than about three times the 

 length of his rod, the canoe is dropped slow- 

 ly down the current, covering fresh portions 

 of the pool at early cast. 



If a fish rises and is missed, or misses the 

 fly, it is customary to give him three or 

 four minutes' rest; and if this does not suc- 

 ceed the fly is changed. As a rule the first 

 rise is the best, but I have known eleven 

 successive rises, ten of them being short, and 

 the eleventh a tiger-like rush that ended in a 

 well-hooked fish. 



Excepting in very large streams a hooked 

 fish should be played from the shore, and in 

 the end it pays to hold the fish hard from 

 the start. As a general proposition the soon- 

 er a hooked fish is gaffed the less risk there 

 is of losing him. 



Near the edge of the pool, or shore, make, 

 your gaffer stand perfectly still, about twenty 

 feet downstream, and work the exhausted 

 fish over to him. If he be an experienced 

 assistant he will remain calm and resource- 

 ful, ready to take advantage of the first op- 

 portunity that may present itself, to slip the 

 gaff into the salmon's shoulder. I prefer to 

 gaff from above. Others always place the 

 gaff underneath the fish with the point up. 

 A quick stroke and the fish should be im- 

 paled upon the gaff, which is raised and 

 turned over by the same movement of the 

 wrist. 



Now, be very sure to kill your fish by a 

 rap on the back of the head with the "priest," 

 a short, handy little club kept for the pur- 

 pose. Then remove the fly with a disgorger, 

 if necessary, and see that the men place the 

 fish in the shade covered with spruce boughs, 

 to keep the flies off. 



The foregoing, is merely an outline of the 

 art of salmon fishing, but it may, perhaps, 

 serve to send some angler satiated of trout 

 and bass to: a northern stream, where he may 

 alone learn the joys and trials of salmon 

 fishing, by actual participation. 



THE ROD. 



All the earlier English authorities advised 

 the use of a long, heavy rod — greenheart or 

 lancewood — and eighteen feet long. Rods 

 were made as long as twenty-one feet. 

 Even today, British anglers use much more 

 ponderous, and probably more powerful rods 

 than Americans prefer, though the influence 

 of American ideas has been very marked, and 

 such cane rods as Hardy and Farlow turn out 



