280 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



[March 24, 1894. 



CHICAGO AND THE WEST. 



\From our Staff Correspondent] 



A Woolly Bear Country. 



At the World's Fair, as I have earlier mentioned, I met 

 a Western newspaper man and former government scout, 

 Mr. J . W. Redington, who told me about some good bear 

 country, the best, in his opinion, now left in the West. 

 Asking Mr. Redington for such details as he could add, he 

 writes me as below. The unique letter head of the 

 Puyallup Commerce is worth facsimile reproduction, and 

 the copy of the paper which Mr. Redington adds is as 

 startling all the way through as the letter is at its start. 

 I am satisfied that Mr. Redington's bear story is due to 

 have wool on it, and know his friend is the right sort, but 

 some way I can't escape the idea that no bear hunt out 

 in that section will be quite complete unless Mr. Reding- 

 ton is along. Mr. Redington's full name is J. Watermelon 

 Redheadington, as his card implies. The letter follows: 



Department of Bkar Hunting and Big Yarns— DICTATED. 



THE GREAT PUYALLUP VALLEY IS THE HOTBED OF THE 

 HOP-VINE AND THE FRUIT-TREE. 

 • • MEMORANDUM • • 



HOME RANCH OP 



TJieOnlyPayallUD Commerce 



Inkstigated by J. W. Redington. 



A Western Washington Paper that 

 Never Cans Dogs, Barely Gets 

 Drunk, and Uses but Very 

 Little Profane Language. 



$2.00 a year— in advance when it can 

 be got. Notary and Fire Insurance 

 Shop. Land .business Done in All 

 kinds of Weather, a Standard 

 Authority on Irrigating Oy.- 

 charts, Clam Trees, etc. Nine* *>srs 

 old and not a Bald Hair in its Head. 

 Bustles made from the Commerce 

 are not affected by electric wires. 



Jan, S, '94 



TO E. Hough, 



Forest and Stream 

 Chicago 



In answer to your elegant 

 epistle of last fall. 



Dear Sir— Referring again to our conversation at World's Fair 

 about a good bear country, etc., I think that the man you want to ar- 

 range with is Capt. S. G. Fisher, present address Blackf oot, Idaho. 

 When I was scout and war correspondent in '77, 1 served under him, 

 and he is a man to tie to. You can read what Gen. Howard says of 

 him in his book "Chief Joseph; His Pursuit and Capture," page 231. 

 Capt. Fisher and his nephew have some quartz mines in the Salmon 

 River region, and they have complete pack and hunting outfits, and 

 they know every part of the wild region. Blackfoot is quite a town 

 on the Utah Northern R.R., about twenty miles from Pocatello, Idaho, 

 on the TJ. P. R.R. Anywhere near there would be a good point to 

 start on a hunt. And Capt. Fisher knows just where to go to get 

 game. When I went into the bear country I went from this side. But 

 come to figure on it now, I see that the best starting point now would 

 be from near Blackfoot or else from near the end of the Wood River 

 branch of the TJ. P. R. R. Capt. Fisher is an intelligent gentlemen, who 

 has been post trader and agent on the Bannock and Shoshone reserva- 

 tion for about twenty years. He resigned last spring to superintend 

 development work on his Fisher mine in the Salmon River region. My 

 last letter from him is from Blackfoot, Idaho, where he moved his 

 family when he left the agency at Ross Fork, Idaho. When I was there 

 last he had quite a collection of Indian curios, etc. 



If you or any other Chicago gentlemen think of going after big 

 game, drop a line to Capt. Fisher, and if you can get him to rig up an 

 outfit and go you will never regret, it. He is a man among men. 



Hoping to meet you at the No-Winter Fair, and that '94 will be pros- 

 perous to you and Forest and Stream, I am, very respectfully, etc., 



J. W. Redington. 



Hoodoos. 



There are such things as hoodoos. We had one in 

 Texas. It was a decoy duck with a broken nose. The 

 fellow who found that decoy in his fleet always had poor 

 luck, and was fortunate if he got back home without 

 getting wet. We tested this so often that no room re- 

 mained for doubt. 



A Horned Doe. 



There are such things as horned does (Virginia deer), 

 at least there is one nead of a horned doe at old man 

 Dorch's place at San Antonio, Texas. The head only 

 remains, but the testimony is direct and not to be doubted. 



Expensive Head. 

 At San Antonio is Albert Friedrich's 78 points head, 

 which was illustrated in Forest and Stream. This head 

 cost in traveling expenses and all about $600. It could 

 not be bought for $1,000. 



All Hens, 



When the bluewing teal first appear in Texas from the 

 North in their migratory flight, they are all hens. You 

 will see no white bars on the head.^ 



To Load Buckshot. 

 To load buckshot so they will shoot close and even, put 

 in a loose layer, then separate the shot from each other, 

 by rolling up little spills of stiffish paper, letting these 

 stick up clear out of tne top of the shell. Then put in the 

 next layer of shot, which will be identical in arrangement 

 with the layer below. After all the layers are in, clip off 

 the tops of the paper rolls even with the top of the shell, 

 put in the wad and crimp. The shot will not jam or 

 scatter wildly, and this method of loading is better than 

 the use of bran, cornmeal or tallow. Percy Stout, of 

 Morrillton, Texas, devised this way. E. Hough. 



" That reminds me." 



While on a visit to a friend about a month ago, at 

 Montreal, the conversation turned upon the subject of 

 rats, which my friend stated were very troublesome in 

 his house, and so cunning as to defy all attempts to catch 

 them. 



I mentioned a case where a rat had been troubling me 

 in my office, finally making his headquarters in one of 

 the drawers of my desk. I set a trap one Saturday night, 

 and was rewarded by finding in it on Sunday morning, 

 part of a rat's fore leg. On Tuesday night, hearing 

 a noise in the drawer, I called assistance and routed out 

 the rat, which we finally killed, and we found that the 

 injured member had been neatly gnawed off at the "el- 

 bow" joint, and was already perfectly healed. 



"Oh!" said my friend, "you can't expect much from 

 country rats. If that had been a Montreal rat, now, he'd 

 have stolen one of your pen handles and made himself a 

 wooden leg." 



Major X., a retired English officer, who lived some 

 months ago in the Credit Valley district, Ontario, used to 

 tell the following story of a wonderful pointer owned by 

 him: 



"I went out fishing one day, accompanied as usual by 

 my dog. Our route lay along the bank of the river, 

 which was at the time remarkably clean. Suddenly the 

 dog wheeled around and pointed stiffly at the water, and 

 following the direction of his point I could dimly per- 

 ceive a large fish, though why the dog should point a fish, 

 I could not at the moment imagine. However, I adjusted 

 my tackle, put a minnow on the hook, cast my line, and 

 in less time than it takes to tell it, I had a fine pike on the 

 bank. 



"As the dog still continued to point him, my curiosity 

 was aroused, and taking out my knife, I cut open the fish, 

 when the mystery was solved — there was a snipe in the 

 pike's belly." Pintail. 

 Soitsl P. Q. 



Buffalo Poachers In the Yellowstone. 



Fort Yellowstone Wyo., March 17.— [Special to For- 

 est and Stream:} Capt. Scott, in charge scouting party, 

 reports from the Lake to Captain Anderson that Park 

 Scout Burgess has captured Howell, the notorious Cooke 

 City poacher with ten fresh buffalo skins, on Astringat 

 Creek, near Pelican. The prisoner has been ordered 

 brought in. This is the most important arrest ever made 

 in the park. E. HOUGH. 



"The Beautiful Flower Garden." 



Readers of Forest and Stream interested in gardening will appre- 

 ciate "The Beautiful Flower Garden," from the press of W, Atlee 

 Burpee & Co., Philadelphia. The book is written by an artist, F. 

 Schuyler Mathews, in collaboration with a professional grower, and 

 is illustrated by over 200 drawings and reproductions from photo- 



A bright idea was that of the author to show how plants of differ- 

 ent varieties appear just after they have sprouted through the 

 ground. All amateur gardeners know how extremely difficult it is to 

 tell the little seedlings from weeds. With these sketches, made direct 

 from nature, any one can tell what would be a poppy and what would 

 he a rag weed. 



All the works previously published on this subject are expensive, 

 treating of great estates and parks; this book is for the million. The 

 subject matter is drawn from the best in the artistic world of garden- 

 ing, showing the influence of the formnl English style, the Italian 

 renaissance and the art of the Japanese upon gardening. An import- 

 ant part is that devoted to descriptions of flowers easily procured and 

 grown from seeds, bulbs and cuttings, with bright sketches showing 

 their forms of growth. The prevailing idea in the book is to teach 

 harmony in the arrangement of flowers and plants. The price is 50 



nts, postpaid. 



The Von Behr is a large trout, much larger than the 

 brook trout, and should never be planted in waters in 

 which the latter fish is native, unless the risk of extermi- 

 nating the smaller fish is first fully considered. The Von 

 Behr, under favorable conditions, reaches the weight of 

 SOlbs. as, for example, in Finland where a fish of that size 

 was caught last year by Mr. Thesleff , as described recently 

 in these columns, A wild specimen, 7 years old, taken in 

 the United States, weighed about lllbs. 



The trout thrives in clear, cold, rapid streams and at the 

 mouths of streams tributary to lakes. In its movements 

 it is swift and it leaps over obstructions like the salmon. 

 It feeds usually in the morning and evening, is more active 

 during evening and night, and often lies quietly in deep 

 pools or in the shadow of overhanging branches and trees 

 for hours at a time. It feeds upon insects and their larvae, 

 worms, mollusks and small fishes, and, like the rainbow, 

 it is fond of the eggs of fishes. In Europe it is described 

 as rising eagerly to the surface in pursuit of gnats and is 

 said to grow most rapidly when fed upon insects. 



It begins to spawn at the age of two years in America, 

 the season extending from October to January. The eggs 

 are from one-sixth to one-fifth of an inch in diameter and 

 yellowish or reddish in color. They are deposited at inter- 

 vals during a period of many days in crevices between 

 stones, under projecting roots of trees, and sometimes in 

 nests excavated by the parents. The eggs are covered by 

 the fish to some extent with gravel. They hatch in from 

 40 to 70 days, according to temperature of the water. 

 The young thrive in water about fifty degrees Fahrenheit. 

 Sterility is common in females, and breeders have been 

 known to cease reproduction when 8 years old. 



The trout is in its prime from May to the end of Sep- 

 tember. Its flesh is very digestible and nutritious, and 

 deeper red than that of the salmon when suitable food is 

 provided; the flavor and color, however, vary with food 

 and locality. Insect food produces the most rapid growth 

 and best condition. T, H. B. 



VON BEHR OR BROWN TROUT. 



Among the "distinguished immigrants" from foreign 

 waters the European brook trout is now nearly as well 

 known in the United States as our own fontinalis. The 

 active history of its introduction dates back only eleven 

 years, and yet the fish is now thoroughly acclimated in 

 Colorado, Maryland, Michigan, Missouri, Nebraska, New 

 York, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and other States. 



In some waters, notably in New York, there is a differ- 

 ence of opinion about the wisdom of its introduction, and 

 this was foreseen by the late Prof. Baird, who devised 

 and set in motion the machinery of exchanges of fish 

 eggs with foreigD countries. It may prove interesting to 

 readers of Forest and Stream to know how the eggs of 

 the trout were first obtained, especially as the request for 

 them was sent from the office of this journal by Mr. Fred 

 Mather. The letter follows herewith: 



Office of Forest and Stream Pi-bushing Co., Nos. 39 and 40 Park 

 Row, New York, Dec. 28, 1882.— My Dear Professor: We think it 

 desirable to introduce both the European brook trout (Salmo fario) 

 and the grayling at the new hatchery at Cold Spring. Should you 

 have an offer of any from your foreign correspondents we will be 

 glad to receive and care for them. Very truly yours, F. Mather. 



On the next day the Commissioner, replied to Mr. 



ANGLING NOTES. 



Will American Saibling- Rise to the Fly? 



My friend, Frederick Bryton, the actor, came to see me 

 last year after a. brief visit to Sunapee Lake, New Hamp- 

 shire, where he had failed to take a single Sunapee saibling 

 on the artificial fly. Mr. Bryton is a fly-fisherman pure 

 and simple, and if the fish that he seeks will not take a 

 fly he never catches them, for he will fish with no other 

 lure. Knowing that I had been to Sunapee Lake several 

 years in succession, he asked me in substance: Will the 

 American saibling or Alpine charr of Sunaspee Lake, rise 

 to the fly? I was obliged to say: Honest Injun! I do 

 not know that any one has taken this fish with the fly. 



My visits to Sunapee have been made in June, latter 

 part; July and August, when the saibling are found only 

 in deep water, and therefore I have not even tried to 

 catch them with the fly. In fact, I do not know that any 

 one except Mr. Bryton has tried them with the fly, and 

 during the time of two visits that he made the fish were 

 in deep water, where they could not see a fly on the sur- 

 face. What I do know is that the saibling affects the 

 small Skinner spoons throughout May and early June, 

 and on the spawning beds in late October, when hundreds 

 are taken for the State hatchery for breeding purposes. 



These are the only times when the fish is at or near the 

 surface, and possibly the right fly has not been offered at 

 the right time and in the right place; for there is no 

 known reason why they should not take a fly if it is pre- 

 sented to their notice. The ouananiche early fishing at 

 Sunapee is casting or sinking a live smelt, the natural 

 food of the saibling; no one apparently has tried the fly 

 so successful with the brook trout and the ouananiche. I 

 further know that next May Dr. Quackenbos proposps to 



.VON BEHR OE BROWN TROUT. 



Mather, and we extract the portion relating to foreign 

 eggs desired at Cold Spring: 



U. S. Commission of Fish and Fisheries, Washington, D. C, Dec. 

 29, 1882. — I note what you say about eggs of European trout and 

 grayling. I am offered plenty of trout eggs, but have hitherto 

 declined them; will, however, ask Von Eehr to send some. Yours 

 truly, S. F. Baird. 



On Dec. 29, 1882, Prof. Baird wrote to Herr von Behr 

 announcing his intention to ship 500,000 whitefish eggs, 

 100,000 lake trout eggs and 25,000 eggs of the brook trout. 

 He had already sent eggs of various kinds, including Cali- 

 fornia salmon. His letter concluded as follows: 



U. S. Commission of Fish and Fisheries, Washington, D. C, Dec. 

 29, 1882.— Dear Mr. von Behr: Mr. Mather is about .starting a new 

 hatchery on Long Island, near New York, in which he will do a great 

 deal of work for the United States. He thinks he would like to have 

 some eggs of the European trout. Can you seud him some? Very 

 truly yours, S. F. Baird. 



The eggs were received in due time, and on March 20, 

 1883, Mr. Mather wrote to Prof. Baird concerning them : 



Cold Spring Harbor, N. Y., March 20, 1883.-3/2/ Dear Professor: 

 Mr. Blackford asked me about those German trout eggs. I told him 

 that I received them through you, and we decided that the State had 

 do claim on them, although we sent Mr. Green 12.000. If you have 

 any orders concerning them we will be pleased to receive them. They 

 are hatching rapidly, and as Frank Clark has asked for some we will 

 send him a Tot without waiting for further orders, as they cannot be 

 delayed long. Hoping that this will meet your views, I remain, 

 Very truly yours. F. Mather. 



The introduction of the Von Behr trout is, therefore, 

 due to the suggestion of Mr. Mather; but it was effected 

 by Professor Baird, whose friendship for and cooperation 

 with Herr von Behr begun many years before the exchange 

 in question was broached. The first streams to receive the 

 young trout were a branch of the Pere Marquette River in 

 northern Michigan and a brook at Caledonia.'N. Y. It is 

 not unusual at present to collect 250,000 eggs of this species 

 at a station in one season. 



devote considerable time to casting the fly for this charr, 

 and he has promised me the record of his experience 

 when I join him at the lake in June. 



In the meantime I can give an extract from a letter re- 

 lating to the experience of an English angler fortunate 

 enough to enjoy a day's charr fishing in a Lapland lake; 

 it was the opposite of Mr. Bryton's. Although informed 

 that this roding or red trout would take neither fly nor 

 metallic bait, but could be caught only in nets. Piscator 

 equipped with flies and spoon baits made his way to the 

 birch-bordered water, with alpine environment, the home 

 of the coveted charr. Attaching a silver spoon with red 

 lining to his line, he soon felt a heavy tug, and thus 

 describes the battle that followed: 



"Down to the bottom went the something, and there 

 sulked in 60ft. of water. But the tackle was strong and 

 we soon made him show himself — a sight never to be for- 

 gotten. A splendid slaty-blue fish, shaped like a plump 

 mackerel, pearly spots along the broad sides, belly gleam- 

 ing a vivid pink, fins dyed like the fingers of rosy morn 

 to an almost crimson hue, and the edge of each fin out- 

 lined as by a pencil mark of silver. 



"No sooner did he show himself than he jumped fully 

 2ft. out of the water. We had no gaff, and netting in our 

 small and flimsy boat seemed a ticklish proceeding, so we 

 made for the shore, where, after a dozen splendid rushes 

 into deep water, C. netted him. He was in the pink of 

 condition and weighed 21bs. 8oz." 



This describes to perfection a spring battle with a 

 Sunapee saibling, whose colors, however, affect the cream 

 with the same pearl spots and white ribboned fins. 



Dr. Quackenbos has told me that one May he hooked on 

 a cast smelt a 41bs. saibling which made for each pound 

 of its weight a magnificent 2ft. leap into the air. Our 

 Lapland angler later tried the fly: "I cast well out into 

 the lake, keeping myself as far back from the water as 



