Oct. 2^, ifKsaj 
habiting such a lake, and by its introduction improve 
the fishing. The wall-eyed pike is a very much more 
valuable fish than the bass or any of the coarse scale fish 
inhabiting these waters. It has, therefore, been intro- 
duced to a certain extent in some of these lakes, but 
not in any waters inhabited by trout or salmon. The 
rainbow trout is a brook trout with habits similar to those 
of the speckled trout. It is not introduced into small 
streams inhabited by brook trout. It has been a success 
in only a few places in this State. The supply, however, 
is not equal to the demand, either of the State Commis- 
sion or the United States Commission. It will endure 
a warmer temperature of water than the brook trout, and 
where it has successfully been introduced is regarded as 
a valuable game fish, and equal to the brook trout as a 
table fish. Senator Proctor has a pond in which he in- 
troduced the rainbow trout, and regards them more gamy 
than the speckled trout, and quite as good eating. The 
rainbow trout takes the lower ends of the streams, where 
the water gets warm and where the brook trout have rurs 
out. The State hatchery does not propogate any varieties 
of fish except the brook trout, lake trout, landlocked 
salmon, the rainbow trout and the brown trout. Most 
of the work at Willoughby Lake has been done by the 
U. S. Fish Commission, but under the direction of the 
chairman of the State Commission. .A.t Willoughby 
Lake the landlocked salmon, of course, are not an ex- 
perimental fish. They are being introduced in all the 
large lakes in Maine. The lake trout is indigenous to 
Willoughby Lake, but the stock has become depleted 
through illegal fishing and, perhaps, to some extent, 
owing to natural causes. The only new fish introduced 
here is the steelhead trout, and quite a number of them 
were caught last season. These fish have about the same 
habits as ihe salmon, but spawn in the spring of the year 
instead of in the fall. They have become successfully- 
introduced in Lake Michigan, where they are regarded 
as a valuable food fish, and the commercial fisheries of 
that lake are of great financial importance. For the 
trout streams in Vermont no fish can ever supplant the 
speckled trout, and the most of the fish propagated by 
the State are brook trout. 
The Commissioners believe that if the State fosters the 
interests placed in their hands, large financial returns will 
result. The State of Maine maintains several large hatch- 
eries, and considers it a good investment. New Hamp- 
shire maintains eleven hatcheries, and the Labor Com- 
missioner of New Hampshire reports the amount in- 
vested in the summ.er tourist business of the State at 
$10,442,352. in 1899. The cash income from the busi- 
ness is estimated at over $5,500,000. A large part of 
the money invested is along the lake shores, and fishing 
is one of the chief attractions. "Incidental with the busi- 
ness of summer boarders, and the opportunities it affords 
all along the upward trend of farm life, in home markets 
for truck gardening, poultry raising, dairy and berry 
supplies, and the general awakening of public spirit and 
enterprise in home conditions, surroundings, and the 
well-being of the tOAvn, come the subjects of education, 
rural mail delivery and better roads, all intimately linked 
with the public weal, and what the best interests of ad- 
vanced civilization demand." 
Vermont has the same attraction as New Hampshire, 
and the same opportunities to attract investments of the 
above character. It is the policy of the Fish and Game 
Commissioners to do what is possible in their depart- 
ment to meet the demands of Vermonters, as well as the 
ever increasing class of summer visitors who are wilhng 
to pay big prices for the privilege of catching a few fish. 
ANGLING NOTES. 
Limit the Basket of Trout. 
A i^EW days jigo a gentleman said to me that I was 
right in saying that angler,s killed too many trout when 
they were in the woods, that all men should be content 
with such trout as could be eaten in camp and ten pounds 
to bring home. It was my opinion that no trout should 
be taken home, for surely the man who had just had a 
season of fresh trout in the woods would not care for 
trout that had been transported a sufficient distance to 
deprive them of their flavor (and this distance is very 
short), and he would not care to give his friends what 
he would not eat himself. .'\ salmon will bear trans- 
portation, and one who receives a salmon may consider 
that a compliment has been paid to him by the man who 
kills and sends it, but it is, in my opinion, no compli- 
ment to kill a lot of little trout and pack them in moss, or 
what not, and deliver them to a friend in a condition 
more suited to the ash barrel than the table, and most 
of the trout brought out of the woods are in that condi- 
tion. They may not quite smell to heaven, but they are 
not fresh, no matter if they have been kept on ice or 
covered with ice. 
It is the bringing home of trout for friends that' de- 
stroys a lot of good fish, and T contend that it is not a 
compliment to the friends. If one must give one's friends 
fish after a vacation in the woods far from town, a nice, 
fat salted mackerel is much more of a compliment, for 
such a fi.=ih is good to cat. 
Last evening I returned home a.fter an absence of two 
weeks, and in my mail was a letter from a very dear 
friend, the mother of two bo3's who will grow into first- 
class sportsmen, because their parents are sportsmen, and 
know hovv to train sportsmen, and I quote from the 
fetter as follows: . 
"We spent last Sunday with the boj's at St. Paul's 
School. They are happy and doing well. G. wants his 
rod, and says there is but one fisherman among the boys 
here. This boy puts back all the fish he catches, no 
matter what their size may be, except ones which he 
kills to eat!" 
I would like to know that boy, and wish I were not 
so old myself, that I could be sure of living to see what 
sort of a man the boy would grow into. Just think of 
a boy killing but one fish of his catch, and putting all 
others back in the water alive! Really, that is the first 
omen that I have discovered that indicates that the 
millennium may be about due. Men — some men — when 
they are approaching the meridian of life, or have passed 
it s few notches, discover that it is not well, or not 
FOREST AND_^ STREAM. 
decent, depending upon the particular man, to kill more 
fish than can be used where the fish are killed, and they 
cease to parade that moth eaten excuse of killing to take 
home to friends. It is possible that at this period of 
life the love for killing, which seems to have been in- 
herited by most men from ancestors perhaps as remote 
as the cave dwellers, ceases in a measure from being 
overfed, but it is a fact that this change actually occurs 
in a few men, but that a boy should exist without a 
highly developed desire to kill is most wonderftd, and 
shows that the world is producing better, in. sppts. 
Tfoat and Low Water. 
In many of the counties of New York there has been 
a great drought this year ; in some sections it was un- 
precedented. Streams that were never before known to 
run dry presented a watercourse of sun-heated cobble 
stones and gravel, with nothing to suggest moisture. The 
newspapers have had items in their news columns stating 
that trout have perished by thousands in conseqeunce of 
the drying up of the brooks and springs, one paper 
stating that millions of trout have perished, 
I doubt if it is quite as bad as the newspapers would 
make it, although some trout have probably been de- 
stroyed by the absence of water in the streams. Trout 
know pretty w^ell when the water is falling, and drop 
down stream as the water recedes, though some do take 
refuge in the pools where springs come in from the 
bottom and where the water is cooler than in other por- 
toins of the stream. In a previous note I tnentioned that 
the men employed at the State hatchery in Sullivan 
county had been engaged in the work of rescuing trout 
in the streams that were drying up by taking them out of 
the pools and conveying them to better and deeper water. 
Since then I have talked with the men who did the work 
and they tell me that not many trout were found in any 
single pool, though the aggregate of all the poofs was 
considerable. While the work was in progress the rains 
came and raised the .streams beyond the danger point. No 
dead fish were found, but it is true that when the streams 
recede, leaving the trout in pools, their natural enemies 
have a better chance to destroy them. Last year I was 
informed that a stream where I had previously planted 
yotmg fish was practically dried up. I examined it for 
.several miles, and though pools were left where there 
were springs, I did not find a single, fish alive or dead; all 
apparentl.v had dropped down stream into a lake into 
which the brook emptied. The fish at some of the State 
hatcheries have suffered from low and warm weather, but 
the loss was confined almost entirely to fry that were 
being reared to fingerlings, especially to lake trout, and 
the. total loss was little if any more than it has been in 
other previous years, when the water has become low 
and consequently warm. One feature of the drought in 
its relation to trout fishing has not been commented upon 
by the daily newspapers that have killed off millions of 
fish with a few strokes of the pen. In northern New 
York the low water has made it necessary for trout to 
seek new spawning grounds in some streams. Men em- 
ployed at one of the State hatcheries in the Adirondacks 
have been seeking the wild trout to obtain eggs for the 
hatchery, and have found the usual spawning place de- 
serted because the water was too low for spawning, and 
they have been searching for the trout in new places. I 
will know more about this matter a little later, but now 
the men have established the fact that in many instances 
trout have been forced to seek new spawning places, but 
that they will spawn somewhere there can be no doubt, 
though the change may change the fishing conditions 
,'?omewhat in the near future in such streams as are wholly 
depehdent upon the natural increase and are not planted 
with fi.sh reared artificially. The trout breeding this year 
in new places becaitse of force of circumstances may re- 
turn to their old haunts next season should there be an 
abundance of water at the spawming time, but the young 
from eggs deposited this fall will probably remain in or 
near the waters where they may be born and there estab- 
lish generations of trout for the future. 
This condition will not obtain to .such a degree ir\ waters 
in more southern portions of the State, where trout 
spawn later than in the Adirondacks, and where the 
rains have raised the streams to normal conditions be- 
fore the spawning period arrives. The difference in 
trout and spawning season between northern and south- 
ern New York may be illu.strated by the following. On 
Oct. 3 I looked over the ponds at .Saranac hatchery, and 
one solitary female brook trout had entered the spawning 
race. Oct, 18 I looked over the ponds at Cold Spring 
Harbor, Long Island, and found two trout fanning the 
gravel in one of the ponds, and both were male trout. 
Oct. 15 10000 brook trout eggs were taken at the 
Sacandaea hatchery, which is beyond and near Lake 
Pleasant. These eggs were taken from wild trout. The 
colder the water the earlier the trout will spawn, and so 
the earliest eggs are taken in the Adirondacks, and as it 
remains colder for a longer period than on Long Island, 
the eggs require a longer time to hatch, as, for' example, 
last year the average time required to hatch trout eggs 
on Long Island was about forty-five days, which was 
shorter than usual, and in the Adirondacks trout eggs 
have been 156 days in hatching, and at the salmon hatchery 
on the Ristigouche River in Canada the eggs of salmon 
have required 210 days. I am not inclined to accept the 
statement that millions ' of trout have perished because 
of the drought, for if the destruction was as great as the 
newspaper items would indicate there would be forth- 
coming evidence of some dead fish somewhere, and as yet 
no one has produced this evidence, and I have been pretty 
well .over the State, and being interested in the matter I 
have tried to get all the evidence possible on the ground. 
Trout understand pretty well how to take care of them- 
selves whether nature frowns or smiles on conditions 
best suited to their welfare at certain places, and whep 
she frowns at one place they seek another where she is 
smiling. As an illustration of this, let me recite from 
personal experience. During the height of the drought I 
was hunting for living springs in Delaware and Sullivan 
counties, and examined all that I could hear of through 
friends who were interested in telling me of the best that 
would serve to provide an unfailing supply for trout 
hatching, At one place the streams were very dry, for 
most pools, and there were rumors that many trout had 
perished. No one Icnew that they had only then assumed 
that they must have perished because the water was so 
low >n the main stres^nis, Up in our little valley, a spur 
3S1 
of the main valley, there was a small brook whcih was 
said never to run dry under any circumstances. I fol- 
lowed this brook to its source, and it was fed by springs. 
One spring, the largest of four, started high up on the 
side of a mountain, and as I climbed up and up, occa- 
sionally stopping to stick a thermometer in the water, I 
found that the little brook which, the spring made was 
full of trout, too many trout to be sustained for any 
great length of time by the fish food natural to the water. 
To one who had never given thought to the matter it 
would have appeared impossible for trout to get up to the 
places where they were, but they were there, and that 
was evidence enough. 
How Do They Do It? 
How do little trout get up over falls and strong 
water, and places seemingly impossible for trout? The 
larger trout will swim up a sheer fall if the volume of 
water is thick enough to envelope their fins, but trout 
2 to 3 inches long seem such weak little things that a 
strong current must wash them away if they were venture- 
some enough to enter it. 
Two days ago I was at the Long Island -hatchery of 
the Forest, Fish and Game Commission of New York, 
and the rearing races were being repaired. The water 
had been diverted from its usual course to enable the 
upper races to be rebuilt, and it was' directed through a 
temporary box into a rearing pond containing several 
thousands of fingerling brook trout. This gave the water 
a greater head at the pond than the fish were accustomed 
to. and as it came in with considerable force it fell on 
an inclined plank just above the surface of the water in 
the rearing pond, making for the little fish a miniature 
Niagara with falls and rapids. The fingerlings instantly 
tackled it, and forty, fifty, a hundred, were jumping and 
in the air at the same time. The inclined plank was in 
the nature of an apron below a dam, and the trout could 
not clear it, but they made some grand elYorts to, and all 
the time the atmosphere over the rough water was filled 
with little trout. As neariy as the eye could measure the 
distance, some of the little trout, 3 to 5 inches long, 
jumped a foot above the water, and leaps of 6 or 7 
inches were not uncommon. All day they were at it, and I 
presume they will continue to jump so long as the water 
comes in with a rush as it does at present. It would be 
well worth seeing as an exhibition of high and continuous 
leaping if the pond and fish could be moved to Madison 
Square Garden during the Sportsmen's Show, and I am 
sure the exhibition would draw a crowd. I advised one 
friend in New York to go dow'n to the hatchery by train 
and look at the show, assuring him he would be repaid 
for the time it required, as he is interested in all that 
relates to fish, and it would interest those who are not 
fond of fish as well as those who are, and then, too, 
seeing is believing. The show will probably continue at 
the hatcherj' until the water is again directed into its 
old course a month hence, so that if any one haopens to be 
in the vicinity during that time I would suggest that a 
call be made upon the leapers in the pond and that everv 
witness of the athletics make it his or her pleasure to 
spread the information regarding what they may see with 
their own eyes. A. N. Cheney. 
South Sea Whitebait. 
For a few days in each year, and always in the month 
of September, the South Sea people have a treat in the 
way of fish — a .small stream runner smaller than the 
Thames whitebait and better flavored. 
The natural history of the fish is obscure. It seems to 
be the fry of some fish, for when taken many have the 
yelk sac still attached to them. The first that is known 
of It is when schools appear in the mouths of rivers. The 
river mouths at all sea.sons of the tide seem fairly alive 
with the multitudes of fish not an inch long, but all swim- 
ming and leaping under the impulse of the instinct to 
ascend the fresh-water streams. Then they are caught 
simply by sinking a piece of cloth in the water and lift.ng 
It by Its four corners at once. A square of cloth 6 feet 
each way will hold at an ordinary draft half a bushel of 
the fi,sh, which the Samoans and many other islanders 
know under the name "inanga." During the few days 
they are running they are taken by millions without 
diminishing the schools in the least. Enormous numbers 
of them are known to pass up the streams, but once past 
the bar at the river mouth they disappear from sight and 
all knowledge. Even in the height of their return they are 
not seen in the streams above the mouth, yet they are 
never seen running back to sea. The run lasts for not 
more than a week or ten days in any one stream, and on 
the Island of Upolu seems to begin in the eastern stream^ 
earlier than in those down to the west. .A,pia harbor has 
two .streams debouching into it. Not more than half a mile 
separates the two, yet the school begins to run in the 
Vaisingano three days before it makes its appearance in 
the Mulivai, which lies to the westward. 
In native cookery they are wrapped in banana leaves 
and steamed for a short tiine. But the catchers eat them 
raw with great avidity. Once a foreign resident secured 
a mess of the dainty fish and gave tiiem to a Samoan cook 
boy to ptepare after civilized methods of cookery. The 
domestic tyrant was not prepared to venture on blunt 
refusal, but he professed to be much shocked at the 
order. When asked why it affected him that way, he 
whispered that, of course, he would obey orders, ' but 
he would have to do it when he could be" sure that no 
other Samoan could discover what he was doing. Still 
further pressed for reasons for so much secrecy, he an- 
nounced that the "inanga" was, in his own way of put- 
ting it, extremely "tufanua" or low caste, and not at all a 
fish for one to eat so highly placed as the family he had 
the honor to serve: It was a clever device, but it did not 
bear the investigation which followed, the question of 
foods proper to certain ranks being interesting if true. 
The frying of the fish showed why the cook shirked the 
task. They keep their vitality for a surprisingly long 
time, and when they are put into a hot pan it is a task 
of much attention to keep them there, for they hop about 
like 50 many winged creatures. It was solely to save 
himself this bother that the cook had invented a low 
rank for a fish that is really superior to any of the most 
famous whitebait, \v^tether of England. New Zealand or 
Puget Sotmci. LLE^VELI,A Pierce ^x7RCHip!:,t., 
