210 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
March 16, 1895. 
Those "Red Trout." 
Editor Fnwn' ctftd SI ream. 
A.ufiulix.'Cal,, Feb. 14.— El Comancho comes at us again 
with his red trout question. 
That's right, El Comancho! "When you have any thing 
on your mind that is troubling you, just keep speaking 
about it until you are relieved! 
I supposed, when I read the first article on this subject 
that some of the sharps would jump right in and explain 
things. As they have not done so, I will try my hand at 
it. 
». Brother El Comancho, those trout that are troubling 
you are nothing more or less than "spent" or "spawned 
out" fish! 
Those same trout, when they left deep water to ascend 
the streams, were plump and healthy specimens of Salmo 
iridem. But after a long journey up the streams, con- 
tending against rapids and other obstructions; after long 
and hard battles with each other over their proprietary 
rights to the spawning beds; after many amatory broils 
and skirmishes, and finally, after the exhausting effort of 
spawning, the trout degenerates into the unhappy and 
disreputable looking specimens you describe. 
After discharging their duties upon the spawning beds, 
they sowly drift down stream again, tails foremost, mak- 
ing but slight efforts to escape the blows and friction of 
the rocks, and many die upon the. way. Finally, when 
they have drifted back to deep water, they get a return 
of appetite; they feed greedily, and very soon recover from 
their wounds, and become plump and sightly again. 
I have seen hundreds of these trout hanging around the 
shores of Lake Tahoe and other Sierra lakes, just after 
the spawning season, in all stages, from death to com- 
plete restoration to health. Profession t.l fishermen in 
these localities call them "spent" fish, and say that they 
are all males. As to this latter statement, I am not pre- 
pared to answer for, but think it is probable. 
There was one old fisherman who used to call them by 
the derogatory name of "wind-splitters," because they 
were so poor and scrawny looking. I have no doubt at 
all about these being the kind of trout that El Comancho 
means, as he has given a perfect pen-and-ink description 
of the "wind-splitter." Abefar. 
No Seines in Lake Champlain. 
St. Johnsbury, Vt., March 5.— The Canadian Fisher- 
man on the shores of Missisquoi Bay, Lake Champlain, 
have received notice from the Canadian Marine and 
Fisheries Department that" no licenses to fish will be is- 
sued this season. As seining is prohibited in the New 
York waters of Lake Champlain and in Vermont, except 
when licenses ;are jssued in Canada, this beautiful lake 
will have another season in which its supply of fish can 
recuperate from the devastations of past years. It is re- 
ported that the wall-eyed pike are increasing rapidly 
under the new protective laws. Whjeelock. 
f#jq£ mid Jftih protection. 
Chatauqua Lake Muskallonge. 
Editor Foiesi and Stream: 
Chautauqua Lake, situated in the extreme west end of this 
State, has long been noted as one of the best muskallonge lakes 
in the United States, and the only waters in the world where 
this game fish has been successfully propagated. It is so far 
away from the home of any game and fish protector, that for 
the past few years fish pirates have had about their own way. 
They have netted and speared until the people living in James- 
town and around the lake, becoming alarmed lest they should 
deplete the waters, organized the Chautauqua Game and Fish 
Protective Association. The object is to enforce the laws and 
bring the violators to justice. The organization has nearly one 
hundred members. Im. S. P. Nixon, our Member of Assem- 
bly, is President, and we have a Vice-President from each 
township in the county. Mr. Niner, our Secretary, and Treas- 
urer, is iu business is Jamestown. Members are joining every 
day, and we are in hopes of getting a membership of three 
hundred. The membership fee is one dollar a year, and our 
object is to get as many to join as possible. 
Shortly after we organized seventy-five fish houses were 
moved out on to the lake and as many men went to spearing 
fish through the ice in direct violation of the law. A game 
protector was sent for and Chas. Ripson came here. I went up 
the lake with him, and in less than ten minutes after our 
arrival we bagged a man with two muskallonge. We brought 
him to Jamestown; he was convicted and sent to jail the next 
morning. The rest took the hint, and the way they moved the 
houses off the lake would put one in mind of the breaking up of 
a camp meeting. 
Last spring a clause was inserted in the law allowing the 
spearing of bull haads in Cbautauqua Lake, and under this pre- 
text a lot of fishermen haviug been spearing muskallonge and 
bass. I do not know who got the bill through, but whoever did 
ought to have a ehromo. Quite a lot of farmers living around 
the lake want to spear a month in the winter, and because they 
cannot get a bill passed to that effect, sympathize with and 
shield fish pirates. They are so narrow minded, it is hard work 
to convince them that the spear is no piotectiou. Here we 
have a lake that the whole State depends upon for frv, to stock 
other waters, and if any lake needs protection this does. If the 
hatchery is conducted as it ought to be, and a protector is here 
to look after the violators of the law, the commission can rest 
assured that chey can get all the fry they want, and still keep 
the fishing up to the-standard. On the otber hand, if the hatch- 
ery is conducted as it was last spring, and no more attention is 
paid to protecting the lake, it would be better to discontinue the 
hatchery and give the pot-fisher full sway. 
The new organization is bound to protect the fish if possible. 
At present tbere is no illegal fishing, but as soon as the ice goes 
out in the spring, they will no doubt try it again. They will 
be met half way. F. W. CHENEY. 
CHAUTAUQUA, N. Y. 
Rather Gloomy Views. 
Manchester, N. H., Feb. 28, 1895. Like the avaricious man, 
greedy for gain, a sportsman was never known to have had 
enough of his favorite pastime to prevent him for any very 
s^reat length of time from wishing for another chance to "get at 
'em." The winter season in this section has given sportsmen 
plenty of opportunity to complain of the conditions that have 
prevailed, as lovers of fox and rabbit hunting have had few 
good days for their sport, since snow came, on acount of crusts 
and exceedingly cold weather. Whenever there has been good 
running, full advantage has been taken of it, the results being 
average strings for the rabbit hunters, while those whose pref- 
erence is for foxes, have, as a rule, fared less fortunately, not 
because of the searcitj' of the game, as there has been no diffi- 
culty in "getting them a going," but the usual straight away 
courses they took, without any known return trips, has saved 
many of their pelts to themselves and reduced the count of some 
of our hunters accordingly. Considering the poor brook trout 
season of last year, and the certainty of its being followed by 
a worse one this summer, on account of the protracted drought, 
the lines of our sportsmen seem to be cast in unproductive 
places. The brook trout season would be much improved if 
shortened. As the average seasons run, most of the streams 
are dry or so nearly so, soou after August 1. that trout are 
obliged to seek a few deep pools from which they fall easy 
victims to thoughtless and unsportsmanlike persons, thus work- 
ing incalculable injury to future and legitimate sport, and 
practical extinction of the fish in the streams thus abused. A 
month taken oft' from each end of our present open season on 
brook trout, would perpetuate aud tend to enhance that fas- 
cinating sport. Your long-time and talented correspondent, 
"Von W." has about the right ideas on the propagation and 
distribution of fish and game, and has done much for New 
Hampshire sportsmen, both in a practical way as Commis- 
sioner, and privately, and by his excellent and sensible advice. 
If all the thoughts he has advauced aud advocated had been 
heeded by our law-makers, we should have had less stupid 
enactments to regret. Where can we find any reasonable 
excuse for extending the open season on pickerel until April 1, 
when they spawn in March? What is gained by the open season 
in trout beginning April 15, when a majority of the waters are 
frozen for three weeks later in the average seasons? What 
reason can be named why any respectable person should want 
to pass a law allowing tue butchery of song aud insectiverous 
birds at the dictation or permission of pedagogues? Surely the 
desires of their pupils for cabinets of specimens ought not to be 
encouraged at so great aud inhuman cost, for if they want to 
acquaint themselves with the habits of small birds, aud are not 
smart enough to obtain such information from living subjects, 
they should be obliged to omit that study. I can imagine noth- 
ing more reprehensible than the sight of teacher and pupils in 
search of birds and their nests, that they may ki'l one, and 
pilfer from the other: and the mau who will sanction the mak- 
ing of such depredations legal, deserves being sent to a reform- 
atory rather than to the general court. Our open season on 
rabbits ends April 1, although weeks before that time the 
females are carrying their young, and no true sportsman will 
molest them. 
I have named a few of the most glaring defects, such as have 
come to my notice without any search or effort. The Legisla- 
ture is now in session, but I do not look for any improvements 
in adaptability or abatement of the weaknesses of our present 
laws, though the attention of members has been called to the 
various needs. With the numerous clubs of sportsmen aud 
hundreds of individuals directly iu sympathy with the acquire- 
ment of fair fish and game laws, and their proper observance, 
the looseness of such things in this State is amazing. 
PAYSON. 
Maine Legislative Game Notes. 
The Maine Legislature continue to do valuable service in 
legislation on matters relating to the protection of game iu the 
State. Thus far the important laws passed have been as 
follows: 
1. To reduce the amount of fish taken at any one time from 
fifty to twenty-five pounds. 
2. To prohibit the hunting, of moose, deer and caribou with 
jack lights, so called. 
3. To make fine and imprisonment for violating the laws 
regarding the illegal killing of deer, moose or caribou. 
4. To make the guide equally responsible, with the one he 
assists in killing game illegally. 
5. The passage of a general law, which puts the control of 
the fish and game under the commissioners so far as to when 
aud under what circumstances they may be taken, and also to 
prohibit the taking fish from ponds, brooks or streams when 
they deem public interests require it. This is done after public, 
notice and hearing, find notices have to be published, and an 
order filed in the town clerk's office, and notices posted on the 
brooks and other waters. It also vacates all commissions of 
the present wardens, so that the commissioners can start by 
appointing new men. It compels that bonds be given for 
$2,000 by all wardens. Only two bills are on their way which 
have not yet been passed, one that of- prohibiting the killing of 
cow and calf moose, which will probably pass and become a 
law. 
Another bill fixing the close time on partridges October 1, 
instead of September 1, is now before the Legislature, with 
prospect of becoming a law. 
The only important measure yet to be presented is the resolve 
for appropriation for fish and game purposes. This has been 
held back in order to see if the general law was adopted. The 
Pish and Game Association of Maine ask for $30,000, and it 
looks as though they would get a favorable report from the 
committee. Tbere will be on the part of some of the economists 
an effort made to reduce the amount, but there is a remarkably 
strong sentiment back of it, and a strenuous effort made to 
carry it through. If this is done, then we may look for a rigid 
enforcement of the laws, and an increase in the propagation of 
fish. Maine has awakened to the importance of its interests in 
this direction and all lovers of sports can be assured that the 
State is not only to keep up her present supply, but will rapidlv 
increase it. The work done by the Maine Sportsmen's Pish 
and Game Association has been effective, and the management 
this winter in securing this advancement in legislation, shows 
that they are to be a potent factor in moulding the legislation 
in the future. CHANDLER. 
Concerning Adirondack Deer. 
A New York man of considerable means has visited this 
region for the past three years and last fall his party killed 
eleven deer. If there is no prohibitive law against hounding 
passed during this winter, he will in the spring order a camp to 
be built for him in the Moose River country somewhere, but if 
such a law is passed he will not have the camp built. It prob- 
ably wouldn't "pay," to kill a respectable three or four, two, or 
one deer, the meat of which could easily be saved from rot, 
which is impossible to do when more are killed. Even the dogs 
cannot make away with so many. That man cannot 
properly be classed with sportsmen, tor as leader of his party 
he should restrain his company, even though they keep within 
the lawful limit of two deer for each individual, and if he will 
not restrain himself he should be restrained bylaw and his 
exploiting of such slaughter made dangerous. 
We cannot hope ever to muzzle the dogs for long. Too many 
influential clubs and hotel keepers must give their members and 
guest means of enjoyment, but a long step to that end would 
be the enactment of such a law as this: 
"There shall be no hounding of deer in New York State dur- 
ing the year of 1895, but in 1896 the use of houuds in the pursuit 
of deer shall be allowed from September 10 to October 31, 
inclusive." 
Then the next year again prohibit the use of dogs and the 
next allow them to be used, and so on indefinitely. I think 
that that would in a large measure tend to the lessening of the 
now rapid decrease of deer in the Adirondacks. The man that 
says that deer are on the increase in the Adirondack region and 
believes what he says after personal observation, must be 
pitied. He is worse off than a blind man, for he sees crooked. 
Prom general observation I firmly believe that the deer during 
the past four years in Herkimer county, have decreased one- 
half, in tae past five years two-thirds. Pive years ago last fall 
a party from this place shot seventeen deer on runways 
adjacent to and on Canachagala Stillwater. This year that 
same party shot three deer and not one had horns an inch long, 
yet the hunters were of the best woodsmen that this region has 
and had excellent dogs for the purpose. 
We woodsmen here cannot believe the gentlemen forming the 
Adirondack League Club when they say they wish to preserve 
the game and preserve the forests. Our own eyes tell us a 
different tale. Between Canachagala Lake and Moose River 
on the old Bisby trail are two great lumber camps "culling the 
spruces," and leaving great piles of tops ready to brown, then 
burst up in flames and sweep the mountains bare, driving all 
game in wild flight before it and perhaps even burning to death 
some unfortunate member of the League. Every fall we see 
from fifteen to thirty hounds, handsome fellows with long ears, 
chained at Barber's hotel, on Jock's Lake, now know as Hon- 
nedago. Those dogs are pretty ornaments, but all the fall, 
from the opening of the dogging season to its close those dogs 
follow the trail of bounding, scared deer, till at last the deer 
springs into the lake, and is there shot down by Leaguesman 
rifles. 
We woodsmen dog deer ourselves, and hire out as guides to 
these "city." sportsmen. Our dogs drive the deer to water. 
But there is not a mother's son of us but feels a thrill of com- 
passion for a deer racing for life, head thrown back aud white 
foam dripping on the dogged trail, even as we shoot it down for 
a taste of fresh meat. When we kill deer the meat is used up, 
jerked, eaten, given to our neighbors, while, too often, we have 
seen a deer shot down that a paltry skeleton head might orna- 
ment a city dining-room. And now we say to one another: 
"They think that they are alone to be considered, and hereafter 
we shall kill without inercy and waste without qualm or con- 
science." They order us from their lauds, they make laws to 
suit themselves and woe to the man that violates them. The 
man who kills for fresh meat must be considered as well as the 
better man, who kills for killing's sake." 
One and all we say, 'iKeep the deer hounds tied up, shoot 
them if necessary, all" the year round," and then we will all of 
us sportsmen, wocdsrnen, men, meet and may the best man win 
the glorious prize of the honorable still-hunter. Ousters, 
floaters, bounders will sit and gnash their teeth to think that at 
last deer are holding their owu, even gaining. 
NORTH WOOD, N. Y. RAYMOND S. SPEARS. 
New York Game Protectors. 
Chief Protector. — J. Warren Poud, Albany. 
Pirst District.— Robert Brown, Jr., Port Richmond— Rich- 
mond, Kings, Queens and Suffolk counties. 
Second District. — Willett Kidd, Newburgh — Orange, Rock- 
laud, Westchester and New York counties. 
Third District. — Matthew Kennedy, Hudson — Rensselaer, 
Dutchess, Columbia aud Putnam counties. 
Fourth District. — Isaac Ken well, Indian Lake — Hamilton 
and all of Essex lying south on a line drawn from the southeast 
corner of Franklin county, east to Port Henry, on Lake Cham- 
plain. 
Sixth District. — John Hunkins, Hermon— St. Lawrence, 
except the town of Hammond. 
Seventh District. — Prank Joy, Boyd — Lewis and all of Her- 
kimer lying north of the towns of Russia and Ohio. 
Eighth District.— John Fields, Middleville— Fulton, Mont- 
gomery, Schenectady, and all of Herkimer lying soutn of the 
north line of the towns of Russia ana Ohio. 
Ninth District. — William H. Wilson, Masonville — Delaware, 
Sullivan, Broome and Tioga counties. 
Tenth District. — Harrison, Hawn, Cicero— Onondaga, Madi- 
son, Cortland and Oswego, except the towns bordering on Lake 
Ontario. 
Eleventh District — Joseph Northup, Alexandria Bay — Jeffer- 
son, the town of Hammond in St. Lawrence county, and the 
towns in Oswego county bordering on Lake Ontario. 
Twelfth District, — Henry C. Carr, Union Springs — Cayuga, 
Seneca, Wayne and Tompkins counties. 
Thirteenth District.— Tunis D. Nares, Watkins -Canadice, 
Ontario, Yates, Schuyler and Livingston counties. 
Pourtenth District. — George M. Schwartz, Rochester —Mon- 
roe, Orleans, Genesee and Wyoming couuties. 
Fifteenth District. — Charles Ripson, Youngstown— Niagara, 
Erie and Chautauqua counties. _ 
Sixteenth District.— James McMilliu, Brodhead— Ulster, 
Greene, Albany, and Schoharie counties. 
Seventeenth District.— Charles H. Barber, Greenwich — Wash- 
ington, Warren and Saratoga counties. 
Eighteenth District. — Ephraim Burnside, Coopeistown — 
Otsego, Cnenaugo and Oneida counties. 
Nineteenth District. — Camerpu Cotton, Bath — Chemung, 
Steuben, Cattaraugus and Allegany counties. 
Onondaga Anglers. 
The annual meeting of the Anglers' Association of Onondaga 
County was called last evening by President Dwight H. Bruce 
with Thomas Woods in the secretary's chair. 
John E. Bierhardt, as chairman, presented the report of the 
executive committee as follows: 
To the Auglers' Association of Onondaga: 
Gentlemen: The executive committee of the Anglers' Asso- 
ciation of Onondaga, in submitting its report for the year end- 
ing March 4, 1895, ventures to express the belief that, consider- 
ing the difficulties under which it has labored — difficulties with 
which all associations or individuals who labor gratuitously as 
this association has for the protection of fish and game have to 
contend — the amount of work done will not be discernible to 
the association. And although more might have been accom- 
plished, it is hoped the fact will be borne in mind that the mem- 
tiers of the committee have had other duties and other business 
to attend to and have not been able at all times to devote the 
time they could wish to give to the cause for which this associa- 
tion was organized. 
Your committee employed during the month of April, 1894, 
two protectors, Henry Jackson of this city, and Arthur Cottet, 
of Cicero, N. Y. At the expiration of the first mouth the ser- 
vices of Mr. Cottet were discontinued and Mr. Jackson was 
retained as protector during May, June and July of last year. 
In August no protector was employed. In September, Charles 
S. Potter was engaged and has been protector for the associa- 
tion until the present time. Mr. Potter, while practically inex- 
perienced when engaged, has worked faithfully and conscien- 
tiously in the discharge of his duties, and your committee 
desires to commend him to the association. 
Your committee has been mindful of the fact that the 
resources of the association are limited and that it was neces- 
sary to exercise economy in the expenditure of its funas. The 
amount paid to all protectors during the year has been $405. 
The waters upon which your protectors have worked are the 
following: Oneida Lake, Onondaga Lake, Skaneateles Lake, 
Cross Lake and Seneca Lake, Seneca River, Oneida River, 
Nine Mile Creek, Limestone Creek, Butternut Creek, Onondaga 
Creek, Chittenango Creek. Geddes Brook, Furnace Brook, Har- 
bor Brook, and Alvord's Brook. 
The nets captured are classified as follows: Thirteen flat nets, 
28 gill, four fyke, 20 trap and four semes. 
There have been during the year 17 violators arrested, nine of 
whom were convicted or pleaded guilty to the charge against 
them. J. E, Bierhardt, Chairman of Committee, Amos 
Padgham, R. A. Molyneux, M. Weidmau. 
Treasurer Charles H. Mowry's report showed the association 
to be in excellent condition and improving each day. There is 
no denying the interest taken and the ensuing year will see 
active arrangements to secure as many new members as is 
possible. 
The membership was quoted at 309 of which 270 members are 
in good standing. On motion by Mr, Bierhardt, aided by sug- 
