128 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



[March 8, 1888. 



asrnuch as the eggs produced from such, a hybrid would 

 not be likely to be too large for the female. 



With regard to the nomenclature, I have already said 

 that I do not think aureolus appropriate or descriptive, 

 and ic seems to me as great a misnomer as Microp- 

 terus salmoides, for the large-mouthed bass. Besides, 

 the tendency among naturalists now is to discard formerly 

 accepted varieties, and Salmo symmetrica, as applied to 

 the Winnepesaukee trout, Salmo amethystus and Salmo 

 confinis have all been relegated to simple Salmo narnay- 

 cush, adapting the Indian name, and che Salvelmvs 

 agassizi, of Dublin Pond or Monadnock Lake, fails to 

 hold its own as a variety distinct from fonUfuilis, 



If this be an original oqnassa derived from the native 

 stock, or the plant from the Rangeley, let it stand 

 oquassa, if it be a hybrid call it "Sunapee," and 

 let us also have the Indian " Winninish" for the jaw- 

 twisting "landlocked salmon." There is still another large 

 trout in New Hampshire to be investigated, viz.. those 

 found in Dan Hole Pond, in Taftonboro', which Mr. 

 Hodge thinks may be found to support his theory of the 

 entirely new variety in Sunapee, and it is to be hoped 

 that lie will be able this spring to secure some of these 

 for scientific examination. Your correspondent, "Bay 

 State Feller." does not make Sunapee Lake quite large 

 enough; it is nearly nine miles long by two wide at its 

 greatest breadth. 



Newbury Station is the most accessible point to go to, 

 from either Concord or Claremont, after the boats com- 

 mence running in May. Sam'l Webber, 



Lake Whatcom.— Of Lake Wliatcom, near Belling- 

 ham Bay, Washington Territory, a writer in the Portland 

 Vindicator says: "The waters' of the lake abound in fish 

 of two kinds, the first being similar to the trout found in 

 all the lakes on the sound, weighing one-quarter of a 

 pound to sis pounds. The other is unlike any fish known 

 on the Sound. It is about ten inches in length, and its 

 body resembles that of a trout and its head is like a dog- 

 fish sa lmon. In October they come out of the deep waters 

 of the lake and go up the amall streams to spawn, beating 

 themselves to pieces on the rocks and snags in their 

 endeavor to get up the stream. Along this rock-bound 

 coast seems to be the home of the trout, being sheltered 

 from rough winds and the cliffs casting its shadow for 

 several hundred yards into the lake. On throwing a fly 

 upon the smooth surface the water seems alive with fish. 

 As many as 175 have been taken along this shore by one 

 person in a day's fishing. 



The Tarpum.— On the back of a photograph of this 

 fish, sent us, is printed: "My tarpum or Grande Ecaille, 

 tyegalojps tlrrissoides — Silver King. One of ten, taken in 

 Senable Bay, Florida, in March, 1886, captured with my 

 ordinary striped bass tackle, a bamboo rod, 5ft. long, 

 weighing but l4oz., a 'Star rubber reel,' a No. 9 striped 

 bass line 900ft. long, the tensile strength of whish is only 

 20lbs.. a mullet bait, and, time of capture 1* hours, with 

 a pursuit of 2S miles. Length of fish, Gft. 3in. Weight, 

 lMlbs. This is probably the most phenomenal catch in 

 piscatorial history, when the weight of the fish taken 

 and the tensile strength of the line with which it was 

 captured is considered. Capt. Dunning, 10 East 129th 

 street. New York city, U. S. A." 



Floating Flies.— Cossayuna, N. Y. — Editor Forest 

 and Stream: In your notice of Halford's "Floating Flies 

 and Howto Dress Them." you say, "We do not remem- 

 ber to ha ve seen them mentioned by our Eastern tackle 

 dealers." I can bear this out; they are as yet unknown 

 practically in this country, and I further quite believe 

 with you that they are well worth a trial. My object in 

 writing is to offer a sample of these flies, tied by myself, 

 to any of your readers who care to write me. I gradu- 

 ated in dry-fly fishing on the self same stream as Mr. 

 Hilford (the Itchen, England), and know precisely the 

 style of fiv he writes so charmingly about.— J. Harring- 

 ton Keene. 



The Renous Sa lmon Club, of New Brunswick, to which 

 we referred a short time ago, has been re-incorporated 

 under the law, of New York. The officers are: President, 

 Emile Hurtzig; Vice-President, Robert B. Forsyth; Sec- 

 retary and Treasurer, Frederic D. Storey, all of New 

 York. These, with Herman Behr, of Brooklyn, and 

 Charles A. Bramble, of New Brunswick, form the Execu- 

 tive Committee, Their advertisement will be found in 

 another column. 



Mr. H. C. Litchfield, formerly of Appleton & Litch- 

 field, Boston, has severed his connection with that firm, 

 and is now engaged in the manufacture of the well- 

 known Nichols bamboo fishing rod, the Bray fly-book, 

 and a new reel. He is doing what he can to help anglers 

 take in the "big ones" with neatness, accuracy and dis- 

 patch. The firm name is H. C. Litchfield & Co., 803 

 Washington street, Boston. 



Weakfishing IS Florida.— Mr. Nelson Merrill, who is 

 a brother of Major H. W. Merrill, is now at Trabue, on 

 Charlotte Harbor Bay, Florida, with Mr. Wm. C. Prime, 

 the author of "I Go A-Fishing." He reports that fly- 

 fishing foi weakfisli, or trout as they are there called, is 

 practiced successfully from the pier near the hotel. 



^mhenlture. 



Secretaries of gun clubs amd others who are interested in the 

 protection of the Yclloivslone National Park are in vited to co- 

 operate with this journal by securing signatures to the petition 

 printed elsewhere. See instructions on editorial page. 



THE DECREASE OF FOOD FISHES. 



[Continued from page 107.] 



THESE pounds, as you will be told, are set very early in 

 the season, as soon as the ice is out and the weather will 

 permit. Prof. Baird reports that in 1871 there were forty- 

 three in Narragansett Bay, thirty-five in Buzzard's Bay and 

 ou the Elizabeth Islands, and fifteen in Cape Cod Bay. In 

 1872 nine more had been added to Buzzard's Bay. Those 

 prior to 1872 are shown upon the map accompanying his re- 

 port. 



In 1876, reports were sent in to the Massachusetts Commis- 

 sioners from 17 only. In 1878, fifty-two; 1879, fifty-three; 1880, 

 sixty-six; 1881, sixty-four; 1882, eighty-five; 1883, eighty-seveu; 

 1884, ninety-three; 1S85, eighty; and in 1886 only fifty-nine 



sent in reports. About 1850 it began to he noticed that the 

 fish were diminishing, as is shown from the evidence col- 

 lected by Prof. Baird, and they continued gradually and 

 annually to decrease, as the testimony will show. Here then 

 are two coincidences, the setting up and increase of the traps, 

 and the decrease of the fish and the decline of the fisheries. 

 When a certain _ event takes place or a certain state of facts 

 is ascertained, immediately followed by another event or 

 state of facts relating to the same subject matter and in the 

 same localities, we naturally connect them together. We 

 begin to believe that the one is dependent upon the other, 

 and the more so the longer this relationship is found to exist , 

 until at length we are forced to the conclusion that the lat- 

 ter is not only contemporaneous with, but that it is con- 

 sequent upon the former. A cause has produced an effect, 

 A continuing and increasing cause has produced a continued 

 and increased effect. 



This is the line of reasoning which led men first to suspect 

 that the setting of the weirs was the true cause of the scarc- 

 ity of fish, and the continuance and increase of the weirs be- 

 ing always followed by the constant decrease of the fish, has 

 forced upon us the conclusion that these formidable engines 

 which, early in the season, capture vast multitudes otfish, 

 have made them now become alarmingly scarce. And this is 

 Of the more force when we reflect that no other cause is 

 known to exist which did not exist before the traps were set. 

 Knowing what we do of the fecundity of fish, we should 

 naturally suppose that, unless interfered with in an unusual 

 way. the number of fish and their size would be about the 

 same year by year. Reasoning forwards, therefore, we 

 should say that whatever hinders or prevents the natural 

 increase of fish would tend to exhaustion. Reasoning back- 

 wards, if we find fishes of any genera becoming annually 

 scarcer, we should say that something had occurred to pre- 

 vent their natural increase. 



It is known that the most of these fishes come early in the 

 season into the shoaler waters near the shore, to spawn, and 

 the traps are already set to take them, and they do take them 

 in vast numbers, as the returns will show. In the years 1884 

 and 1886 more than four million edible fish were reported to 

 have been caught, and in the latter year one-half of the 

 pounds sent in no report. It is not possible to overestimate 

 the magnitude of the loss occasioned by the capture of such 

 avast number of breeding fish. It would amount to immedi- 

 ate and absolute annihilation but that some few come in too 

 early for the traps, or in their migrations manage to escape 

 them. Not enough do so, however, to keep up the supply. 

 If the object had been to destroy these particular fishes be- 

 cause they were nuisances, the 'ingenuity of man could not 

 have devised a more effectual method. Captain Atwood not 

 only does not attribute the decrease of fish to the trappers, 

 but he commends them in that they are. producers, In what 

 way they are so I could not at first make out, but more study 

 of the matter satisfied me that they have been the producers 

 of more mischief and destruction than any class of men since 

 the landing of the Pilgrim Fathers. 



Up to about 1860 the catching of these fish gave employ- 

 ment to thousands of hand-line fishermen, with their smacks 

 and boats, and furnished a cheap and wholesome food to all 

 the inhabitants upon the seashore, The supply was always 

 equal to the demand. When, however, the railroads began 

 to provide easier means of transportation, when ice came to 

 be used to retard decomposition, when fish came into more 

 general use as one of the ingredients of fertilizers, and an in- 

 creasing population made a~ market for larger supplies, de- 

 vices more or less ingenious were prowled to supply the in- 

 creased demand. Then traps, pounds and weirs came into 

 use, and have increased to such an extent that the hook and 

 line fishermen caught fewer and fewer each year, until now 

 hardly any of the fishes in question can be caught with the 

 hook and line. As a consequence, the men so employed have 

 been obliged to abandon the business. Several theories have 

 been advanced by the defenders of the weirs to account for 

 the scarcity of fish, to which I beg leave briefly to allude. 



We are told that if these fish do not come into our bays as 

 plenty as formerly we are to suppose— 

 % That there are some conditions necessarily wanting. 



2. That for some unknown cause they have disappeared. 



3. That the waters have been rendered impure. 



4. That their food has become scarce, 



5. That other fish have destroyed them, especially the blue- 

 fish. 



The first of these suppositions originated in Rhode Island, 

 and was promulgated in the minority report of the com- 

 mittee on fishes of that State. It is the most ingenious and 

 comprehensive guess of them all. It covers the whole 

 ground, and settles the question. Some condition are neces- 

 sarily wanting. They are, that these fishes, having come 

 into our bays to spawn, are captured by the traps, and so 

 their natural increase is stopped. The time and opportunity 

 to deposit their spawn are the conditions which are warning, 

 and the weirs alone prevent them. What happens to the 

 eggs after they are deposited, what risks the little fry 

 hazard, what numbers become the food of other fishes, will 

 happen any way, but nothing can be shown which captures 

 or destroys our breeding fish before spawning except the 

 engines which are constructed by the ingenuity of man and 

 used by him to satisfy his avarice or greed. If you have 

 killed your hens before they have laid, there is an end to 

 your poultry, and it is no answer to say that even if the eggs 

 were laid, some would not hatch, some of the, chicks would 

 die, the hawks would kill some and the rats more. Enough 

 would still survive to keep up your stock. 



2. That from some unknown cause they have disappeared. 

 The Massachusetts Committee, in their report, say that it 

 does not necessarily follow that when fish leave a locality 

 they have been driven away by over-fishing. Nor do we 

 claim any such thing. We do not claim that they have been 

 driven away at all. We say that they have been caught up 

 by unseasonable fishing and have become scarce. When 

 this theory of disappearance was first advanced, we could 

 not, any of us, say that it might not be so. Now, what are 

 the ascertained facts about the disappearance of fish? 

 Captain Atwood gives the names of a few species which 

 have disappeared or changed their location, which he had 

 noticed "during a long life of pratical experience in the 

 fisheries." He argues that, because some fish have disap- 

 peared or changed their locality, these fish of which we are 

 speaking may have disappeared. 



In view of this the Massachusetts Commissioners inquire: 

 How then do the facts stand? "Here are four important 

 fishes of different genera, of different habits, eating, to some 

 extent, different food; and these fish suddenly agree in 

 diminishing, and that diminution is, in some cases at any 

 rate, contemporaneous with the start of trap and weir fish- 

 ing." In such a case, on whom does the burden of proof lie? 

 Most certainly it lies with the advocates ot* trap fishing to 

 show that this method does not diminish the fish (Report 

 1871, p. 74). Precisely the same line of reasoning is to be 

 followed here that was taken by Rimbaud in his review of 

 the report of the- .English Commissioners, Captain Atwood 

 fell into the error of "compounding under the common 

 name of 'fish' of all the vertebrate class taken by fishermen." 

 Rimbaud shows that a classification is necessary. "A class- 

 ification founded not on anatomical characters but on habits 

 and localities." 



Rimbaud makes four divisions. For our purpose only two 

 are needed: 1. Wandering fishes, the most of which arc sur- 

 face fishes. 2. Bottom fishes. The difference chiefly to be 

 borne in mind is this: That whereas the wandering fishes 

 appear on our coast only when migrating, and then in vast 

 but uncertain troops, the "latter are especially domestic, 

 and dwell and multiply on particular localities along the 

 coast." According to such classification, the chub mackerel 



and the shad belong to the first division, of which there is 

 no doubt they appear and disappear for no assignable cause. 

 They come, they are gone, is all that can be said about them. 



Now, what are the ascertained facts about the disappear- 

 ance of fish ? for diminution is not disappearance. There is 

 a law apparent even in the going and coming of these in- 

 habitants of the waters, dependent, upon the instincts and 

 habits of fish. It is this that the change is then sudden and 

 entire. In the list of fishes of which Captain Atwood says 

 they have come and are gone, this peculiarity is not noticed 

 by him, When he laid aside the evidence and alluded to the 

 changes he had noticed in fifty-one years, he names no spe* 

 ties that disappeared or changed locality gradually or par- 

 tially. They went all at once, and when they came back 

 they came in legions. There had been a total disappearance 

 of scup previous to 1793. In that year they returned, and 

 were afterward abundant. The Spanish mackerel, he says, 

 although plentiful for many years, has long since disap- 

 peared. I have not (he says) seen a single specimen for the 

 last twenty years. So in 1840, the shad appeared in large 

 quantities, and in 1842 they disappeared. Some sixty years 

 ago, he says, the squeteague was vastly abundant, and was 

 absent a great many years. The flat fish almost wholly dis- 

 appeared, and seemed to be nearly exterminated hi the 

 waters north of Cape Cod, only a few being seen. But the 

 striped bass have, he says, diminished, and so he says that 

 all agreed that scup, tautog, sea bass and striped bass have 

 within a few years diminished in Buzzard's Bay. Of these 

 fish, it will be noticed that while they are not wandering 

 but domestic fishes, not only have they become fewer in 

 number, but smaller in size, which would not be the case if 

 they had disappeared. Whatever cause would be sufficient 

 to make the large fish go away, would have the like effect 

 upon the smaller specimens. 



The pounds and weirs, as reported since 1883, took 8,841.- 

 (103 scup, 24, 408 striped bass, 210,071 tautog and 724,312 other 

 edible fish, (Mass. Report, 1886, Table 8, p. 96.) These eight 

 or ten million fish evidently had not disappeared. What 

 reason is there to suppose that others of the same genera 

 had done so? The support for such a theory" is very slight 

 at most. We do know what the weirs have" done. "We do 

 not know that any have disappeared, but if they have, here 

 are two causes for the scarcity of fish, one of which we can 

 and should control, and the other we cannot. I think a dis- 

 tinction should be made between disappearance and change 

 of locality. There is no question but that the scup, which IS 

 a schooling fish, change their grounds, not so far as I can 

 learn, however, but that they can be tracked. If they can- 

 not be found in the upper part of our bay, they may be at 

 Saughonnet Point; if not to be got at the bottom, they may 

 at certain seasons be found on the shores. By disappear" 

 :uice T understand that the absence Which cannot lie tracked 

 or explained, Sometimes we catch no tautog in a place 

 where heretofore we have found them, when by going 

 to another ledge of rocks they bite freely, as we say] Early 

 in the spring we find them about the rocks near the shore 

 and around the wharves; later we seek them further out oil 

 the ledges, and still later, in the autumn, we catch them at 

 the wharves again, Then they go into winter quarters. 



3. As to the impurities in the water, this manner of ac- 

 counting for the diminution of fish is hardly worth a thought 

 and I dispose of it by quoting the language of Capt. Atwood, 

 who says; "But in the great sea man cannot pollute its 

 waters by anything he can do." 



4. Scarcity of food. Upon this point I refer to the article 

 of Mr. Lyman (Mass. Report, 1872, p. 35). Prof. Baird dis- 

 poses of it by stating that the dredging showed the food of 

 these fishes existed in great abundance, and that there was 

 not the. ieast danger that it would, fail. Certainly it will 

 not while the fishes which subsist upon it are diminishing. 

 The long list of invertebrate animals of Vineyard Sound and 

 adjacent waters is before you, only the naines of which it 

 would take hours to read. The same authority says: 'As 

 a general result, it may be said that so far from their being 

 any scarcity of invertebrate life in the waters during the 

 summer of 1871 as compared with earlier years, its actual 

 amount was such as to strike with astonishment every one 

 of our party engaged in the inquiry. The validity, there- 

 fore, of the assumption of diminution of food may be denied 

 in the most positive terms" (Report of United States Com- 

 missioner, 1871-2, pp. XXI., 295). 



5. The ravages of predaceous fishes, especially thehluefish. 

 There was a time when this question presented difficulties 

 not easily to be met and overcome. The United States Com- 

 missioner says: "It is a pelagic or wandering fish, going in 

 immense schools, and characterized by a voracity and blood- 

 thirstiness whiehj perhaps, has no parallel in the animal 

 kingdom. The fish seems to live only to destroy, and is 

 constantly employed in pursuing and chopping up whatever 

 it can master. As some one has said, it is an animated chop- 

 ping machine. Sometimes among a school of herring or 

 menhaden, thousands of bluefish will be seen, biting off the 

 tail of one and then another, destroying ten times as many 

 fish as they really need for food, and leaving in their track 

 the surface of the water covered with the blood and frag- 

 ments of the mangled fish." 



Again he says: ''I ascertained by a careful inquiry into 

 the number shipped by the dealers along the shore that 

 about a million and a quarter could be estimated as the 

 number captured along through Vineyard Sound and on the 

 coast from Monomoy Point through Long Island and sent 

 to market in 1871. Any one who bag seen these fish will 

 judge not. one in a hundred is taken. If, now, we admit the 

 presence of 100,000,000 bluefish^ in these waters referred to, 

 we may form some estimate of the number of fish destroyed 

 by them. To estimate twenty per day as the number des- 

 troyed, if not devoured, by each bluefish, is by no means 

 extravagant when we bear in mind my own examination 

 and the testimony of others. If, therefore, 1^,000,000,000 are 

 eaten in one day, the number destroyed off the New England 

 const in a season of 120 to 150 days can easily be estimated." 

 (18,000,000,000,000.) 



"Indeed, I am quite inclined to assign to the bluefish the 

 very first position among the injurious influences that have 

 affected the supply of fishes on the coast, jet with all this 

 destruction by the bluefish, it is probable that there would 

 not have beeii so great a decrease of fish as at present but 

 for the concurrent action of man" (Report, p. xxiii). See 

 also Captain Atwood's remarks to like effect '( Massachusetts 

 Report 1871, p. 68). 



Mr. Lyman, in view of all this, merely says: "On the 

 whole it will be perhaps pretty near the truth to say that 

 although the bluefish blindly destroys almost everything 

 that comes in his way, his main food is the soft fishes and 

 mollusks, such as menhaden, mackerel, alewives and squid'' 

 ( Massachusetts Report 1872, p. 35). This is the only notice 

 Mr. Lyman takes of this element of destruction, except to 

 say that the bluefish theory is an old one, but new in its ap- 

 plication to scup. It is not claimed by Prof. Baird, destruc- 

 tive as he has shown the bluefish to be, that his victims are 

 to any considerable extent the edible fishes, about which we 

 are now inquiring. He has found scup in the maw of the 

 bluefish, but not iu great numbers, while as to the tautog 

 and the others it is not claimed by anybody that they con- 

 stitute any portion of their food. 



It will be shown that the traps capture vast numbers of 

 the softer fish, which are food of the bluefish, and so force 

 him to attack anything he can find. So this theory entirely 

 fails to show that the bluefish was accountable to any great 

 extent for the scarcity complained of. That Captain At- 

 wood should not have felt very kindly disposed toward this 

 I "Animated Chopping Machine," which not only depopu- 

 lated his bay of nearly all other species, but depopulated his 

 village and his home, is not to be wondered at, but it was 



