March 8, 1902] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
191 
The real amateur, though, who is drilled in the game, 
goes after the fish in the same business-like way as his 
professional friend. If he lives in Jamestown he sets his 
alarm clock at 5, or else hires a policeman to ring his 
door bell at that hour. By 5:30 or 6 o'clock he is on 
his way up the lake. An hour later you will see him 
working like a pack horse on a Rocky Mountain trail, 
and as the first beams of the rising sun sparkle across the 
ice his coop door closes behind him, and that is the last 
you see of him until nightfall, when he crawls out and 
compares notes with his neighbors, and then hies his way 
homeward with the day's catch strung proudly on his 
back with the tails snapping on his boot tops. 
Henry Tiles, of Mayville, is one of the last' mentioned 
class of amateurs. He went out last Thursday morning 
and advices received up town at 4 o'clock in the after- 
noon were to the effect that he had caught one 30 
pounder and two smaller fish, which would bring the total 
catch of the day up to at least 60 pounds. 
Dewittville Bay was covered with coops. In all 53 
fish were caught during the day, the weight of the catch 
figuring up to 185 pounds, making an average weight of 
three pounds and a half per fish. It will thus be seen 
that numerous small fry were taken out, especially when 
the fact is taken in consideration that several large 
catches were reported. One weighed 35 pounds and an- 
other which was caught by Reuben McCoul weighed 21 
pounds. A young man named Aikens caught 11 fish 
which numerically was the largest catch at Dewittville. 
West Frank, of Celoron, made the champion catch of 
the day. He went out bright and early in the morning 
and set his coop in the vicinity of Grass Island, and en- 
sconcing himself snugly inside, patiently awaited the com- 
ing of the fish. He did not have long to wait. Soon a little 
fellow flopped merrily into the hole and was speedily cap- 
tured by Mr. Frank. -The first fish was small, but the 
fisherman consoled himself with the thought that the 
next would be larger, and so it was — a half pound or so. 
Mr. Frank remained in his coop spearing fish until the 
sport became as monotonous as pitching hay. When he 
finally concluded to quit he had depopulated the lake of 
17 muscallonge, all of which, however, were small. 
Joseph Gould, of this city, went in for variety. After 
spearing a nice fat muscallonge, he captured six bull- 
heads and then concluded to quit. Bullheads are pretty 
fair eating, 
Albert Shildmacher was fortunate enough to spear four 
fish, the whole of which averaged about 20 pounds. A 
billfish that came his way was also removed from the 
lake. 
Frank Cheney, the veteran fisherman, who has studied 
the habits and haunts of the muscallonge so carefully 
that he almost knows the 'longe language, was up the 
lake and when he had nothing else to do he counted fish 
coops. 
"Between Bellview and Celoron," said he, "including 
both shores of the lake, there were 360 coops." 
Mr. White, of Lakewood, captured a fine 25-pounder, 
and was naturally elated over his success, 
Harry Seymour, of Bemus Point, made the champion 
catch of the day at that place. The fish weighed 38 
pounds. 
It was also reported at Bemus Point that an 11-year-old 
boy named John Carlson, from Ellery Center, made the 
next best catch, his fish weighing an even 30 pounds. 
Other Bemus Point catches reported are a 15 pounder by 
Ira Brown, a 23 pounder by Taft, and smaller catches by 
Mark and Morris Cheney. 
At Mayville the list of catches may be summarized as 
followed: Will Tyler, Q fish aggregating 45 pounds; El- 
ton Miller, one, 25 pounds; A. Sackett, five, the largest 
being 22 pounds. 
Ed. Irwin is reported to have caught a 25 pounder near 
Chautauqua and Mr. Wilcox a 20 pounder at the upper 
end of the lake. 
District Attorney Green has a fish coop at Mayville, 
and as soon as court adjourned he disappeared from view 
in the direction of the lake. His catch has not yet been 
reported, but it is rumored that there was wild commotion 
among the leaders of the muscallonge. tribe as soon as 
the story was circulated by submarine telephone that the 
district attorney of Chautauqua county was on the lake. 
Mr. Green remained in Mayville over night, and, if he 
is as persistent in pursuing piscatorial prey as he is in 
chasing criminals, there will be little left for the other 
fishermen. 
J. F. Taylor, of Stow, caught over 100 pounds of fish 
during the day. The largest weighed 33 pounds. Mr. 
Morton, of Stow, also brought in a 20 pounder. Another 
gentleman, whose name was not learned, brought in a 
35 pound fish. 
The dealers are paying from 10 to 12^ cents per 
pound for muscallonge, and selling the same at retail 
at from 15 to 18 cents per pound, according to size. The 
large ones, of course, are sold cheaper than the smaller. 
E. L. Underwood spent Thursday in his fish coop near 
Midway, and came home in the evening with three nice 
muscallonge as a result of his day's work. 
San Francisco Fly-Casting Club. 
Medal contests, series 1902, Saturday, contest No. 1, 
held at Stow Lake, Feb. 22. Wind, west ; weather, good : 
Event 
Event 
Event 
No. I, 
No. 2, 
No. 4, 
Distance, Accuracy, 
Event No. 8.- 
Lure 
Feet. 
Per cent. 
Acc. % 
Del. % 
Net* 
Casting % 
J B Kenniff 109 
92 
92.8 
77.6 
S5.1 
95.5 
H E Skinner 
91.8 
91 
79.2 
85.1 
H Brownie 89 
91.8 
87.8 
77.6 
82.7 
57.5 
E A Mocker... 93 
82.4 
92.4 
77.6 
84.11 
35 
W Mansfield...- ... 
93.8 
92.4 
82.6 
87.5 
90.8 
T Brotherton... 98 
91.8 
91 
78.4 
84.8 
86.2 
C R Kenniff... 104 
92 
76 
70 
73 
95.8 
T C Kierulff.... 79 
81.4 
80 
72.6 
76.3 
C F Grant 115 
90 
S8.4 
76.8 
82.6 
W T Kierulff... 77 
79.4 
74 
75 
74.6 
C G Young 
93.4 
91.4 
85.10 
88.6 
H C Golcher... 119 
92 
88.4 
80.10 
84.7 
W E Brooks... 101 
94 
89.8 
76.8 
83.2 
H F Muller... 100 
94.4 
88.8 
81.8 
85.2 
G H Foulks... 87 
86 
76.8 
81.4 
Chas Huyck.... 88 
S A Heller. 
77 
74.2 
75.7 
.57.8 
Judges, Mansfield and Muller; 
referee, Grant; clerk, 
WOK*, 
iThe Old Shad Fishing^Piers. 
HH'~*"" From the Hartford Times. ■ ~ 
Encouraged by the unusually large catch of shad in 
the Connecticut River last season, the fishermen of the 
down the river towns from the Haddams to the Sound are 
making more extensive preparations for the spring fish- 
ing than they have ventured into within the past quarte r 
of a century. From present indications it is safe to 
predict that when the dogwood trees burst into their 
spring raiment of shad blossoms (the fisherman's infalli- 
ble sign that the proper time to string his nets has ar- 
rived) the shores of every reach along the river banks will 
be dotted with the huge net reels. 
It is also understood that the owners of many of the 
old fishing piers located below the Shore Line railroad 
bridge are considering the advisability of putting them in 
running order and try their luck for the season. The 
demand for Connecticut River shad, the Simon-pure arti- 
cle, has for several years been considerably largen than 
the supply, and with a fair season's catch the pier fisheries 
would be certain to pay a high dividend. Forty years 
ago it was not uncommon for the "hand shares" or "lays" 
on the piers to amount at the close of the season to 
several hundreds of dollars. Opportunities to ship on 
the fishing crews were eagerly sought for and often a, 
large bonus would be paid. 
The first shad fishing pier ever operated on the Con- 
necticut, as far as can be traced, was located at the mouth 
of Ragged Rock Creek, at a point a few rods below 
the Shore Line bridge, on the west side of the river. 
Capt. David Ingraham was the leading spirit in the con- 
struction of the pier, and for many years he was the 
acknowledged "boss" of operations there. The pier was 
built of huge logs floated down from Lyme and placed 
one above the other, forming an immense oblong box, 
the interior of which was filled with stones brought in 
scows from the Sound shore, several miles below. In 
the center of the pier stood the great capstan reels, with 
their tremendous barrels, to which were attached the long 
hauling lines running to the shore and hauling arms of 
the net. The fishing gang usually worked the reel which 
brought in the shore arm, but the hauling arm, which had 
to be towed shoreward against the strength of the swift 
and powerful ebb tide was reeled in by horse-power. At 
this pier some large catches were made. The pier was 
called Jamaica bjy its owners, and even at this day traces 
of it can be seen. 
Going northward from the mouth of the river, the first 
^fishing pier was located just north of the lighthouse. It 
~was known as Pavement, taking its name because of the 
hard stone bottom that stretched out from the shore to 
the bank of the river channel. The greatest day's catch 
recorded at the pier was 4000, some 1700 being taken in 
the second hauling of the net. North of Pavement very 
near to the present location of the pretty quarters of the 
Hartford Yacht Club was Folly pier, so named because 
the pier was erected against the judgment of experienced 
fishermen, who predicted that owing to a strong eddy 
which continually threw back in a tangled mass upon the 
shore the nets as fast as they were set it would be a 
failure, and so it proved. 
Cooteborough pier lay northerly from the lighthouse. 
It was owned and operated by people from Pettipaug 
(now Essex), and its peculiar appellation was a derisive 
reflection upon the bravery of their un-the-river neigh- 
bors during the British raid in I#i4 at Essex. The Eng- 
lish commander was Lieut. Coote, and as the inhabitants 
deserted their homes and fled like sheep to the hills in the 
rear of the town on his landing at the river front, they 
for years were laughed at by the people of sister towns. 
Next in order came Knock-em-Stiff, a pier where only 
one haul wase ever attempted. That one was never com- 
pleted, as drifting into a strong and powerful eddy, the 
net became unmanageable and in spite of the most 
strenuous efforts of the men at the capstan, the latter be- 
gan to revolve rapidly backward and finally threw several 
men to the ground so forcibly that a physician had to be 
brought by boat to the pier to dress their injuries. No 
further attempts to fish it were ever made. 
Under the long wharf that runs out from the front 
of the Pease house are the remains of the Fort Fishery. 
A few rods above it stand the old Saybrook fort, which 
for many years in the early history of the colony and 
State Was kept continually garrisoned. 
As a means of raising funds for the support of the 
church, the members of Saybrook Congregational So- 
ciety, early in the last century, erected a pier at the 
mouth of the North cove and for a number of years it 
was considered one of the most successful on the river, 
and added many dollars to the church treasury. It is an 
old tradition, perhaps an untrustworthy one, that one 
season, when the shad were running in unusually large 
numbers, the crew of the Parsonage pier could not resist 
making a haul on Sunday, and to the dismay of the rigid 
Sabbath day observers of the vicinity, it proved the 
largest of the season. 
Directly opposite the lighthouse, on the east shore 
of the river, was a famous pier, known as Sodom, but 
which early in the ^50s was nearly washed away by the 
changing of the river channel. With that liking for 
biblical names which was characteristic of the pious in- 
habitants of Lyme, the owners of the pier when they 
moved to another location a few rods northerly called 
the new pier Zoar, for, said they: "Did not Lot flee 
from Sodom to Zoar?" Then came the two Griswold 
piers, Gibraltar, so named from the fact that it was at 
the foot of a rocky eminence, and two piers known as 
Sanford's and St. John's. On the same side above the 
bridge was the Calves' island, the lower, middle and 
upper-end piers upon Nott's island, located directly 
across from the Essex steamboat wharf. 
Some idea of the number of shad caught in olden days 
can be gained from a record taken from the note-book of 
an old-time fisherman, which states that in 1817 the 26 
Saybrook piers salted 2,194 barrels; 17 Haddam piers, 146 
barrels, and the five East Haddam piers 169 barrels. 
While the life of the pier fisherman demanded much 
hard and oftentimes uncomfortable labor, it had its 
pleasures as well. In every fish-house there was some 
inmate, usually the cook, and he was a high and mighty 
•personage, too, witi* w&QW eacft member did hU beat to 
ingratiate himself, who could play the violin, and nightly, 
after the day's catch had been dressed, salted and packed, 
out over the water would drift the strains of lively music 
and the echoes of tapping boot-heels on the floor. The 
great holiday of the fishing season was the spring election 
day, when a grand supper was given, to which all the 
wives and sweethearts of the crews were invited. The 
menu was an elaborate one, the piece de resistance being 
bass chowder, broiled sturgeon and planked shad, and 
they were washed down by copious draughts of hard 
cider, a few barrels of that beverage being a customary 
and important portion of the outfit of each fishing pier. 
The first pound nets, which of late years have caught 
nearly all the shad that have been shipped from this sec- 
tion, were introduced by Frederick Kirtland in 1858. 
Several years later Mr. Kirtland was induced, by a large 
salary, to visit Lake Ontario, and instruct the fishermen 
of those waters in the methods of manufacturing, setting 
and fishing pound nets. 
CHICAGO AND THE WEST 
Destruction of Western Fish, 
Chicago, 111. . Feb. 27. — During the past week there has 
been observed in the Desplaines River, just west of this 
city, the greatest number of dead fish ever recorded there, 
the shores being in some localities lined with the dead fish 
to such extent as fairly to constitute a nuisance. It was 
hardly supposed that this highly civilized and not very 
much valued stream had so many fish left in it as it has 
produced, albeit in a condition quite past all surgery. 
Refuse from mills is the cause assigned. Nobody to 
blame, not in the least, and nobody gets the worst of it 
except the fish, or possibly those who might some day 
have had an interest in them. 
Similar destruction of fish for some more or less mys- 
terious cause is also reported this week from the Calumet 
River, which flows into Lake Michigan at South Chicago. 
The dirty little stream was yesterday so full of dead fish 
that fear was expressed lest the water supply at the lake 
cribs might be polluted. Never mind. It is nobody's 
fault. _ If the water is bad, never mind. Take your 
medicine. 
Still another case of stream pollution and great loss of 
fish life is reported to-day by Mr. John Melbourne, of 
Saginaw, Mich., occurring in the Cass and Saginaw 
rivers, the cause being the refuse from the beet sugar 
factories. Mr. Melbourne says, "There is no stream in 
the State which had such variety and such numbers of fish 
as the Saginaw, but as the sugar factories are on the 
increase, it looks as though the fish would have to go." 
The Saginaw News prints a report from Vassar, on the 
Cass River, as below: 
"A few weeks ago the dam in the Cass River was 
blocked by a mass of fish which had collected there as a 
result of the slaughter caused by the emptying of the 
refuse from the Caro factory into the river above. He 
said that it was a sight never before witnessed bv the 
residents of that village. The authorities there took the 
matter in hand and men with rakes were put to work 
cleaning out the dead and decaying mass, and it is 
claimed that thirty-five teams were used in hauling away 
the refuse and that many tons of fish were taken out and 
buried. The mass contained everything in the fish line, 
from the smallest minnows to grass pike over three feet 
in length. The citizens of Vassar, it is said, intend to 
appeal to Governor Bliss to have a State Fish Commis- 
sioner sent there to investigate and steps taken toward 
the abatement of the nuisance. 
"The Cass River between Caro and Vassar is com- 
paratively narrow and shallow, so that the contamination 
is much more than in the Saginaw River, which is fed 
with much fresh water from the Tittabawassee and Shia- 
wassee, thus accounting for the comparative freedom 
from injury to fish in this river. The large volume of 
water here, it is claimed so dilutes the refuse from the 
factory that it is rendered practically harmless. Reports 
from the mouth of the river at Bay City are to the 
effect that many fish are killed there, but the amount of 
refuse poured into the river there is much larger, making 
the contamination of the water so much stronger. 
"Governor Bliss was asked by the News this morning 
what report, if any, he had received of the matter, and 
he stated that no word had come to him at this time. 
He stated that when the factories were running last sea- 
son a similar complaint was received from that locality 
and that, he sent the game warden to investigate. The 
report which came back to him at that time was that 
the factories had provided a way in which to get rid of 
their refuse without turning it into the river and that 
the trouble had been corrected. He says that when he 
has any further complaint he will take such action as 
seems best." 
Market Firm Fined. 
The Booth Packing Company, of Chicago, was fined at 
Grand Rapids, Mich., last Tuesday, the fine being $75 
and costs, for fishing in waters of Lake Michigan near 
St. Joseph during the close season. This is one of the 
cases brought against market-fishers by Deputy Brewster 
last fall, and it is pleasing to see that he is making the 
cases stick. Appeal was taken by defendants., the case 
being hotly contested on both sides. 
E. Hough. 
Hartford Building, Chicago, HI. 
Senate Bill No. 367 in the New York Legislature pro- 
vides that wherever in the law the possession of fish or 
game is forbidden, "reference is had equally to such 
fish, game or flesh coming from without the State or to 
that taken within the State." This is a most important 
provision, and is designed to remove any possible ground 
of evasion of the laws against the possession and sale 
of game under the plea that it is of foreign origin, and 
not subject to the law. The bill also provides that dealers 
may hold in stock during the close season game and fish 
on hand at the close of'the open season. This provision, 
we understand, has the sanction of the Fish and Game 
Commissioners, and Protector Pond is of opinion that it 
would render more practicable surveillance of the mar^et^. 
