Dec. 14, 1901.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
47S 
It is difficult to conceive how such distinctive races of 
fish can. be developed, unless maintaining an isolated ex- 
>4stence, roaming the sea either in shoals, which with 
salmon is unlikely, or -else in scattered distribution, but 
keeping toxich with one another through the operation oi 
some mysterious sense, and only assembling in closely 
massed ranks upon the occasion of their annual migra- , 
tion. Individual salmon have not infrequently been 
caught at sea, sometimes at great distances from their 
native streams; but except when' gathered for the pur- 
pose mentioned, it is probable that they do not "schoor'f 
in the manner of herring and mackerel. Prior to their 
recurring annual pilgrimage, the presumably dispersed 
members of the colony must assemble at a given time, 
and that such approximation of individuals is readily ac- 
complished may be interred by the presumptively regu- 
lar annual junction of the migrating fry with the parent 
stock in the shadowy deeps. For without such union 
it would seem that the perpetuation of the distinctive 
characteristics of the race- could not be effected. It 
cannot reasonably be assumed that the product of each 
hatching maintains itself separate and apart from its 
Huvial associates, inasmuch as such isolation would 
preclude the uniform appearance of the individuals con- 
stituting the colony. 
It is therefore a fair conclusion that the descending 
fry associate themselves and intermingle with the parent 
stock; but such meeting, it is evident, could not be 
readily effected save by the operation of some unusual 
faculty. The tiny pilgrims, leaderless and guideless, 
but certainly directed by an infallible perception, after 
holding an undeviating course through hundreds of 
miles of trackless obscurity, are enabled to recognize 
their particular kin; to unerringly detect them in the 
darkneijs of the great deep. 
Salmon in the sea not unlikely band themselves as do, 
or perhaps it were better to say, as formerly did, the wild 
cattle of the South American pampas. Darwin, in his 
"Journey of a Naturalist, in the Beagle," chapter VIII., 
states that their habit of gathering in small bands or 
tropillas enabled the stock owners (estancieros) to keep 
count of herds, amounting to ten thousand or more, each 
of the tropillas being identified by the markings of the 
more notable animals, and so the absence of a single 
individual was readily detected. The tropillas numbered 
from ICQ to 150 each, and received no accessions save 
from natural increase. If the immense herd was stam- 
peded or mingled in a dark and stormy night, or if by 
any other means the tropillas became broken up and 
merged in a general mass, any one individual would pick 
out the members of its own particular flock from the 
thousands of strangers, and thus each tropilla would re- 
constitute itself. So, too, if driven to a distant market, 
and escaping, the eager brute would pass vast herds of 
alien cattle to rejoin its own particular community. 
Some other sense than smell, it is clear, must have been 
the guiding impulse. Moreover, the tropilla, like the 
salmon school, is not stationary; it probably wanders 
erra:tically; it is not therefore a perception of locality 
but of individuals that guides the estray to the bosom of 
his "family. A generation later than Darwin, M. Couty 
visited the same region officially, his report being pub- 
lished in the "Revue Scientilique." He, too, was pro- 
foundly impressed by the utter absorption of the in- 
dividual in the tropilla, each living out its life side by 
side with others of a vast multitude, but remaining entire 
St! angers to all save its family. He corrobo-ates Dar- 
win as to separated individuals passing thousands of 
other animals without noticing them, in their efforts to 
rejoin their sundered kin. 
The remarkable faculty of intuitively det< rmining the 
relationship of an unknown fellow member that is pos- 
sessed by the salmon, and which enables the infant to 
unite itself with the parent swarm is also a characteristic 
of bees and ants. 
In a single hive there may be 50,000 bees, and a colony 
of some species of ants may number over half a million; 
yet any metnber is recognizable by another.^ A stranger, 
though of the same species, is at once detected, but an 
associate is known as such even after months of ab- 
sence. A power of discernment so assuredly exercised 
among such an extraordinary number would seem to in- 
dicate the possession of an emanation or radiation com- 
mon to each member of the insect community, and 
recognized by means of a special sense. With ants this 
subtle perception does not, as with moths, appear to be 
remotely exercised; but with fish it may be fairly in- 
ferred that the scope of individual recognition is in- 
definite. Among the piscine structures of uncertain 
functions are the muciferous canals; the skin of fishes, 
indeed, contains a variety of mysterious organs. Some- 
of these are probably the seat of the obscure perception 
that apparently enables fish to take cognizance of ob- 
jects near and remote, and without which their extended 
and devious Wanderings would be impossible. 
A. H. GousAUD. 
tExcept when migrating, young salmon show no tendency to 
congregate in schools, U. S. Fish Com. Rep., 1897. 
So, top, cod appear to distribute themselves, except when 
migrating, and even then do not mass themselves as do herring, 
etc. - Swbrdfish arrive and depart in loosely arranged schools. 
JLubbeckIs "Ants, Bees and Wasps," Chap. VI. 
Items from Southern California* 
The past summer, preceded as it was by a wet winter, 
it dia .not supply a great amount of sport for the hot- 
weather sportsman, assuredly proved favorable for in- 
creasing game of all kinds, as forage has been plentiful, 
streams have flowed not previously for three seasons, 
breeding deer have been enabled to range more widely, 
quail to escape with, numerous progeny from their natural 
enemies, and the local trout to spawn the brwks with a 
multiplicity of small fry. All considered, because of a 
return to normal conditions in this part of the country, 
we may look ahead .for agreeable pastime with rod or 
gun. ■ .'. '. 
; A prolonged visit to Ventura, a very cool sea coast 
town but fourteen miles from our present home, enabled 
me to become better acquainted with the salt-water life 
^long; jthese shores. To avoid the heated term Hkely to 
QCGtff: in the Ojai Valley during August and September, 
mi fgiiniljr , rw»fc4 * cottage jpear .th«^ beaph for tb^t 
period, and while there I spent nearly all of my time 
either on the water front or making observations from 
the pier. Seine hauling took place nearly every day. 
Angling seemed popular, though the fish taken were ex- 
ceedingly small. Whatever his bait or contrivance, every 
one had unseemly words for the peridinium, or the red 
water, to which all attributed the poor run of luck. 
Shortly before going to Ventura, while looking over 
back copies of Forest and Stream, in the number dated 
Dec. 3, i8g8, I read a description of the "red water" in 
Narragansett Bay during the preceding autumn, con- 
tributed to science by Mr. A. D. Mead, in which the 
violent coloring observed along that part of the New 
England coast was said to have been caused by the peri- 
dinium, or by animaculae, such as had invaded the Nile 
during the plague, turning the water to blood. "And the 
fish that was in the river died ; and the river stank, and 
the Egyptians could not drink the water of the river, and 
there was blood throughout all the land of Egypt." The 
effect along the New England coast, by the account in 
your paper, was manifest in dead fish and effluvia. The 
recent visitation to our Western coast, however, has had 
in it no such unsavory accompaniment, 
At the appearance of the odd-looking water, which 
was first noticed near San Diego early in the summer, 
bathers took alarm, the worfien declaring that such a surf 
would destroy their hair, render them bald-headed, and 
the men, seeing no pleasure in a bath without comrades, 
were at a loss until some imaginative individual circu- 
lated a fable that "red water" produced hair, maybe red 
hair, thus bringing back to the sea an eager cohort of 
bare-headed plungers. In your paper no mention is made 
of the hair-restoring qualities belonging to the peridinium. 
Another peculiarity of the "red water" observed along 
this coast recently, and not mentioned in your accottnt or 
any other, so far as I know, has been the brilliancy which 
it gave to the ocean at night, a glow everywhere startling 
to behold. When the affected area had crept up the coast 
as far as Ventura, 'bus loads of our Ojai citizens went 
down there evenings to see the display. Local liverymen 
just jingled pocketfuls of coin and added to their yarns. 
Ventura people thanked Providence and hoped the water 
would stay. The ocean at night, though, was well worth 
seeing. I was familiar with the phosphorescence of the 
Gulf and the Atlantic, but neither compared with the 
f^ash to be observed on many nights along this coast. 
When the water happened to be particularly rough, bright 
gleams in groups occurred over an area that extended at 
least half a mile from shore; or, if the rollers approached 
smoothly to break in numerous lines of breakers, all the 
rough territory appeared to be continuously aglow, for 
miles of coast, from submerged lights. During our stay 
near the seashore we spent many evenings on the beach 
watching the phosphorescence, on several occasions to be 
greeted by the rising moon, which first appeared there 
directly down the .surf line, and we felt all of it to be 
unusually superb. 
The run of fish may have been influenced by the 
phenomenal conditions. Some of the rod men and net 
haulers held to this view. Others told me that the ocean 
directly off Ventura is never very productive in this line. 
Whether this is due to the cold temperature of water or 
to other cause, no one could inform me. The tackle in 
general use on the pier consisted of a fine line strung with 
innumerable small gangs, that reached from surface to 
sea bottom, and the cominon bait was either earth worms 
or cut shark meat. The fish taken seldom exceed eight 
inches in length. A small variety of pompano, which 
sold for thirty cents a pound in Ventura, at a dollar in 
San Francisco, seemed to be highly prized. Local net men, 
with seines scarcely 500 feet long, at times brought in as 
much as seventy dollars' worth of these at a single haul. 
They preferred the little ones to black groupers and great 
sea bass. 
On one overcast morning in September, while I was 
fishing from the pier, several of lis saw miles of ducks in 
continuous passage, the line consuming more than two 
hours in moving by, but much to our surprise the flight 
led up the coast, though likely a premonition of the hot 
wave that came later. By Oct. i, or the opening of our 
hunting season, ducks, curlew and all the waterfowl were 
said to be more plentiful than for years. The vast pre- 
serves held along the coast by hunting clubs may have 
had a beneficial effect, as property thus controlled, besides 
being flooded the pa.st season at considerable expense, and 
guarded, had been planted with celery and other forage. 
The number of preserves of this sort has increased 
within recent years until the good shooting is nearly all 
pre-empted. Among other clubs to own water front 
within easy distance of Los Angeles are the Cerritos, 
which now owns the Bouton Lake ; the Bolsa Chico, near 
Newport; the Recreation, at Ballona; the Pomona, near 
the Bolsa Chico; the Santa Monica, Alia. Centinella and 
various other like affairs. Ex-Governor Henry H. Mark- 
ham, I believe, is a member of the Cerritos, while the 
rolls of all the clubs have on them the names of many 
individuals just as famous. With so much, of the gam.e 
country occupied by clubs, the obscure gun is seriously 
put to it for his himting, and were it not that ducks really 
seem to increase in number, he might well question 
whether private concerns should be permitted to close out 
the public from so much good territory. 
Several flights of band-tailed or collared pigeons have 
appeared in the Ojai this fall up to date, Nov. 15, and the 
acorn crop being unusually large, we may look for addi- 
tional flocks. One of your contemporaries may still be 
unable to identify these birds, for only a few months ago 
his paper could not place them in ornithology, and the 
editor even asked if they might not be the passenger 
pigeon, at one time so plentiful throughout the Atlantic 
slope. Comment is unnecessary. 
More useful papers in the same line have a nearly un- 
touched field for their energies. With all the cant to the 
contrary, we must believe that the average hunter learns 
but little from coming into contact with nature. Ap- 
parently he goes abroad to kill, and for no other purpose. 
Count satisfies his intetfest. Though there be many 
notable exceptions, too great, a number have an eye only 
for slaughter. As a lamentable instance, a short while 
ago a Santa Rosa sporting cliib held a hunt for destructive 
birds and animals, at which twenty hawks, many black- 
birds, squirrels and bluejays were killed, and over nine 
hundred larks, though the Western larks, in addition to 
being ovir sweetest singers afi?It}, are §0 elearl/ useful, 
Intelligence would cause a moce just appreciation for 
feathered creatures. 
Local deer hunters had scarcely any luck the past 
season. Abundance of water made exposure unneces- 
sary for game. A number of grizzly trails were seen by 
our .sportsmen, but no bear, perhaps through bashfulness 
of the human- Great bands of plumed quail, in number.s 
beyond my most extravagant dreams, frequently come 
down from the hills to our valley, where denser cover 
renders the shooting more of a sport than it has been in 
past seasons. One has such a fine time with these strong- 
winged coveys. 
An item likely to be of interest to you came indirectly 
to my knowledge a short time since. No names were 
mentioned, or need be mentioned, as the incident concern.s 
a State official, well known to a large number of Cali- 
fornians, and though meritorious in itself, is one that my 
informant inight hesitate about giving too great publicity- 
Years ago, if not quite back to forty-nine, an ambitioijs 
young man, his fancy aflame with fabulous report, his will 
indomitable, left a quiet home in the East to identify him- 
self with the restive big West, and after rough wander- 
ing through rough country he arrived on the coast. His 
experience gave him a story to tell — several of them — 
but want of education made him diffident about writing 
anything for publication. This unique character, though, 
imbued with a courage that had not been daunted by 
scalping knife or inhospitable country, at last unlimbereij 
a pen, charged it with long-distance ink, then tracked an 
editor to his lair, and as contributions appeared in print, 
he gloated over them with greater interest than he had 
ever gloated over rare game, much as Dr. Coues would 
have gloated over a bird strange to science. Close atten- 
tion to changes made by the editor. Brown's grammar, 
with an appreciative intelligence, soon made writing easier. 
The paper to which this contributor sent his articles was 
Forest and Stream. H. R. Steiger. 
Ffed Mather's Modern Fishcwitufe. 
Providence, R. I., Dec. 9. — Forest and Stream Publish- 
ing Co. : I feel indebted to you for a treat from the 
perusal of Fred Mather's charming and witty little book 
on fishculture. I have been groping around in the dark 
myself the last two or three years, and finding out slowly 
the things that he describes as public errors, and am much 
amused to find that my mistakes are those of everybody 
else. Fred Mather was a fit disciple of the great Walton, 
and I for one have derived a lot of pleasure, as well as 
information, from reading his book. Every one of the 
opinions that he has expressed in opposition to generally 
accepted views I unhesitatingly endorse. 
George L. Sheplev, 
Fixtures. 
BENCH SHOWS. 
Dec. 15.— New York, N, Y.— Ladies' Kennel Association of 
America's inaugural dog show. 
FIELD TRIALS. 
Dec. 11.— Glasgow, Ky.— Kentucky Field Trial Club's swond 
annual trials. Dr. F. W. Samuels, Sec'y. 
" Sport." 
Under this heading, how many different divisions 
could be discussel, and how widely diversified would be 
the opinions were each man with sportincr instincts called 
upon to give his own acceptance of the term. We have 
in this town several men who place at the head of the 
list in the category of sports — coon hunting. They hunt 
with one dog, one night each week, and always quit 
when they get one coon. And how they talk about the 
sport of it! Here is the account of their last coon hunt 
as related by them. I will say before beginning that I 
have never been coon hunting, so may possibly slur over 
the part wherein lies the keen pleasure of cornering 
Brer Coon, who is a doughty fighter as well as a skulk- 
ing chicken thief. If this turns out to be the case, T 
shall expect to be "called down," from which the en- 
lightenment will more than heal the lacerated feelings, 
Thei'e were three in the party; they started off at 11 
P. M. with a rooe, a beagle, a lanter-n, package of grub, 
an ax and a single barreled shotgtm. They walked 
three miles over a rough road before reaching the do- 
mains of his coonship. It then started to rain; they 
didn't mind that, though it was blowing cold out of the 
northwest. 
After hunting for nearly an hour, the dog, which had 
been working along the opposite side of a small stream 
of water, treed a coon. Excitement then ran riot! They 
all had on hip boots, but unfortunately the river was 
swollen from recent rains, and there was nothing for 
them to do but wade across. True, they could have 
gotten across by walking down stream a quarter of a 
mile, but they were wet anyway and the dog was urging 
them to hurry, so in they went. It was waist-deep for 
two, btit the fellow who carried the lantern made a 
beautiful back dive from a slippery bank. This was bad, 
but they found the tree in which the coon had taken 
refuge. It was a chestnut about lyi feet in diameter. 
They couldn't shin up it in their wet clothes, so they 
started to chop it down. After an half hour of vigorous 
hacking they had it most through when it was decided 
that it would be necessary to get another lantern, for 
"Dipsic," the beagle, had been up against a coon before 
and consequently retained a wholesome respect for the 
whole family. 
One of the boys went to a friend's house a mile away 
and got a lantern. He banged on the door, started the 
dog barking and brought the old man down to the door 
with a gun in one hand and a candle in the other. He 
was a coon hunter, too, and wasn't a bit mad at being 
routed out. He not only loaned them a lantern, but vol- 
unteered his assistance. In the meantime the other' two 
sat down on a water-soaked log and ate some moist 
sandwiches. They were chilled through, and as they 
S3t there in the dark woods listerijjig to the disjnal pit- 
m 
