FOREST* AND STftfiAM. 
487 
his mouth, and I noticed that he had been struck in the 
hinge of the jaw. Mf. Spaeth and his guide told me 
that the fish had leaped twerity-sfiven tittles, and duf- 
Ihg the night they had had their hands full at times 
to keep him under control. I attribute the length of 
time taken to land the fish to the early darkness 
brought about by the smoke-laden air, the manner in 
which the salmon was hooked, which prevented drown- 
ing, his wiry build and a very natural anxiety on Mr. 
Spaeth's part not to lose, what, Was apparently an uii- 
Usually fine specimen. My guide referred. to the sal- 
mon as "one of those devil salmon," and I Hilcf he be- 
longed to that variety. 
It Was not Mr. Spaeth's first salmon.. Last year, 
while 1 was at Moosehead, I saw him bring in two 
Weighing about ^ pounds each, ahd this ySSr. he had 
caught one before he hooked into the above fish. H6 
is a splendid fisherman, keeps his head. and knows what 
he is about, attd I fancy that even if darkness had not 
come upon him, he would probably have had his work 
cut out for him. It is somewhat ufiugual to stay up 
all night to take in a salmon weighing 7Y2 pounds, but 
I think that if you Wfire to include the midnig;ht trip 
of the guides, the manner irt which the fish Was hooked 
and state that Mr. Spaeth is liO't a tyfo irt handling 
landlocked salmon, that a good maiiy fishermen WOuld 
know that lie had had ail uilusual proposition on his 
hands. 
At the request of Dr. French, Mr. Coult aild I cer- 
tified to the length of time it took Mr. Spaeth to get 
his "fish in the net, and as I am already accused of 
bringing back some rather unusual fish stories from 
the State of Maine, I am more than anxious to have 
the facts correctly stated. 
It is also worth knowing that Mr. Coult, of our 
party, caught a ^Va-pound square tall in Square Lake, 
and also brought in a 10-pound landlocked salmon 
from Salmon Lake. It took hlili a little Over an hoiif 
and forty-five minutes to latid the salmon. 
CHICAGO AM) THE WHST. 
The Saginaw Crowd In Camf* 
Chicago, June 5. — The Saginaw Crowd had the pret- 
tiest camp last week which they have ever made on any 
fishing trip, and perhaps a prettier was never pitched 
on any stream. The three big house tents belonging 
to Mr. Davis, Mr. Mershon and Mr. Harvey were in 
line, close up to the bank of a great pool on as loviely 
a little trout river as ever rippled out of doors. On 
another cornel' of a big quadrangle the camp nien 
had their Wall tent. In the center Stood the dinmg 
hall, made with a big canvas fiv for rOdf and Wattled 
evergreen boughs for sides. Add. to this the COok'S 
shelter, not to mention two admirable fires. One for 
cooking and one for lounging, and yOu have a canip 
which, as typical of modern artgling at its best, could 
hardly be surpassed. Had the weatliCr been as decent 
as everVthing and everybody else, the week . of_ the 
Saginaw' Crowd in camp would have been ideal. Evert 
in spite of the weather, these doughty fishermen pre- 
vailed, as 1 am sure many of thetr frfends in Saginaw 
will testify after receiving some of their baskets of 
fish. 
The pfetsotitifel of the party this trip was good, of 
t'Ollfse, but above all things triinsient and uncertain. 
Mr. C. H. Davis, as owner of this wiiderrie'ss. preserve, 
was commander-in-chief, as was the case last ySar. 
He went early and stayed late, and so did George Mor- 
Icy, who was not of the party last year. Mr. Mershon 
WHS in at the beginning of the camp, but was obhged 
to leave a day before It broke. Mr. James Peter, of 
Saginaw, another Crowdite, and a member of the first 
fishing trip last year, Went home with Mr. Mershon a 
day early. Mr. Thomas HilrVey, a new member for a 
trout trip, went home on Sunday, aftef three days in 
camp. Mr. Graham H. Harris, of Chicago, and my- 
self, after considerable telegraphing, managed to get 
into camp by Sunday noon, but were obliged to leave 
on Wednesday morning. In spite of all this confusion, 
the Saginaw machine ran as smoothly as ever. Martin, 
the camp cook, was most excellent good. We had 
George King and George Higgins and little Harry 
King and another teamster or so to help keep things 
moving, and lastly, Harry, the long-time camp man of 
the Saginaw Crowd, was on hand once more, in spite 
of his late threats to desert civic life altogether and go 
to a university. Out of the whole force present there 
was not one who could not cast a fly upon occasion or 
eat a dozen trout at a sitting, should necessity demand 
it of him. 
As to the trout, they were there, any quantity of 
them, thousands and hundreds of thousands of them. 
Ill my two days' fishing 1 suppose I took something 
like 300 trout.' Mr. Davis, in one day, put 39 in ^'S 
basket, and threw away 115. Of course I can't say that 
nearly all of these trout were real trout. They were 
little fellows of the 6-inch class, just below the State 
limit of seven inches, and in some cases not more than 
4 inches long. The stream was literally swarming with 
them, and they constituted themselves an angling nuis- 
ance. It was actuallv wearying to be releasing these 
littlp lellows from the hooks all the time. We resorted 
to big flies and to different styles of fishing, but the 
little ones would not be denied. Unless some cataclysm 
of nature or pot-fishing ensues, this stream ought to be 
in splendid shape for next year. 
This is not to say that there were no big trout taken 
on the trip. On the contrary, we caught larger fish 
this time than we ever did before. Mr. Mershon had 
pne trout which went over 15 inches, the largest we had 
«ver yet taken on any of these wild Michigan streams. 
Not to be outdone, Mr. Davis, on the very day that 
Mr. Mershon started away, came into camp with a still 
larger trout, one measuring 16,^2 inches. Of 12 and 
ij-inch trout we had any number. Our total number 
fjl fish for the trip, all rods combined, was about 400, 
Nothing very extraordinary in the way of fishing, but 
ilUite enough for comfort and sport. The showing was 
iome 50 fish behind that of last year, when not quite so 
'much \otal time was put in at fishing. This discrep- 
■^ncv, which was not regrptted by any Olie in particular, 
^* - iv.'. - -- ■'--1 »'^''' 
v/as no doubt due to the unfavorable weather condi- 
tions of the past week. The wind was northeast and 
east every day, while the boys were in camp, while 
part of the time it was so cold that ice froze more 
than half ati Inch thick in the water pail at night. 
After a short eJiperience with Mr. Harris, to show 
him something of the stream, my first day was put in 
wnth Mr. Mershon ort the wildest and most inaccessible 
part of the river, where it rurts through a very heavy 
and inaccessible swamp. We drove up the river more 
than eight miles from camp, skirted a heavy virgin hern- 
lock forest and at last found the cache, where two little 
boats Were hidden. One Of these, a canvas craft, we put 
together^ and Mr. Mershon and 1 started down stream 
through the wilderness, taking turrts «1 the boat, on the 
ride-and-tie principle. In this way, since we were able 
to travel much more rapidly in the boat, we managed 
to g€t through the eight miles Oi' §0 of inaccessible 
country in thh« to get to the team before dark, George 
King, having meantifne driven back and touched the 
stream at the other end of the cedar swamp. Even with 
the boat we found it a full day's fishing, and toward 
the close we were obliged to hurry ov€f sorne of the 
best Water at a time when the trout were rising fairly 
wCil. Earlief in the day we did not do much, for the 
wind was from the east and so high that one could 
Mi-dly keep a fly out of the treetops. 
There arS times when the trout are coming fairly 
well, when i conceive the notion that 1 am quite a fly- 
iisherman, then agin tlierg fife tim'es when the trout 
are nOt disposed to rise, more especially times when I 
am out with Mf. Mjrshon, that 1 revise my opinion of 
my own prowess. The first time we ever went through 
this wamp together, my companion gave me a good 
trimming up, and he repeated this dose upon the pres- 
ent occasion. His basket had something like a dozen 
Splendid fish when we came to check up, and all I could 
claim was Hve. We had, however, almost without ex- 
ception, beautiful fish, and I shall remember for a long 
time the battles 1 had with some of my biggest ones. 
Twelve^ thirteen, fourteen, fifteen inches— these are all 
food ffieasm-enients for Michigan wild streams, and the 
fish were beautit'ul, clean specimens, dark-backed and 
higlllt ^ioiored. 1 have never seen fishing any more 
interesting thafi WC had irt this swamp, and regret that 
i could not have just am tflore go at them, as I think 
flow I have mastered my fflorc expert companion's 
secret. 1 would slip down ort him quietly with the boat, 
when it was fll}' turn to drop down stream, and catch 
him standing up to his waist in the water, with not a 
ripple about him, his arffl close at his side and his 
line ridiculouslv short. We fished together for a whfle, 
and I was laying out a line shorter than I thought 
necessary. "You can't catch a trout on that long a 
line/' said Mr. Mershon, and I presume he was right. 
My whole experience on this trip was that if you 
want to catch trout j;ou don't want to try any long 
distance casting. It is more in the wading than in 
the casting, very much more indeed. The man who 
wades down stream and casts as he walks is not going 
to get very manv trout. His fly lights just before or 
just after the eclge of the wide series of ripples, and 
no big trout is going to take it. -I got nearly a couple 
Of Aamn nice trOOl on my last day's fishing and did it 
on a line not much more than twenty feet in extent. I 
made it a I'uk in going into any likely water, to stop 
perfectly still and to wait until the ripples had all sub- 
sided and until the water was clear of all discoloration; 
then I would begin my casting. If I raised a good 
trout and did not hook him, I was careful not to slap 
back in again in the same place, but would cast some- 
where else for a minute or two, and then try him 
again, endeavoring to place the fly gently just above 
the place where I had seen him rise. This method I 
found successful. The short line allows one to keep 
his tip well up and makes him far more certain of 
hooking a rising fish. The line is always straight, and 
a fly can be handled very much more delicately than 
it can on a long line by any fisherman, no matter how 
expert. It was the short line and the light fly and the 
careful wading which got the big trout for the lucky 
ones in the cedar swamp. . 
Mr. Mershon was not alone in this art, for Mr. Davis, 
who spied out a hidden path along the stream and 
fished lower reaches on the same day that Mr. Mershon 
and I were higher up, came out with a simply splendid 
basket of fish, some seventeen in all, not a baby in the 
lot, and every one of them more like Quebec and Mich- 
igan in size. Mr. Davis said that he caught nearly all 
of his trout, either while crouching down on his knees 
or while getting as low down as he could into the water. 
Yet these big trout, according to my companions, are 
not really very wild, which is contrary to the supposi- 
tion of most folk. The truth is, no man can under- 
stand the brook trout, which is the most mysterious 
being in the waters under the earth. For instance, Mr. 
Mershon caught his biggest trout in less than three 
minutes after I had dropped down across a deep hole 
in the boat. He says that a trout is easily frightened, 
but that ,he does not remember it very long. The re- 
sults of our fishing seem to bear out these conclusions. 
At any rate, we certainly got trout, and big ones and 
plenty of them. 
Every night, when the different parties came into 
camp, the catches were laid out on a board, so that all 
might have a look, and it was agreed that in size the 
take this year surpassed anything which the Saginaw 
Crowd had hitherto had in any of their Michigan trips. 
It may be seen that the occasion was one of great re- 
joicing, therefore, and the only regrets were those oc- 
casioned by the weather and by the broken nature of 
the companionship in camp. 
There were two species of flies very abundant on the 
river, one the large, gray drake, similar to what we 
call the sand fly here in Chicago, or the shad fly or 
soldier fly of other parts of the country — the fellow 
with the upright wings and the long up-curved tail 
and soft body. Another species was a small four- 
winged fellow, which hatched out in countless thousands 
of an evening or early in the day, if the water- con- 
tinued cool. We found a large queen-of-the-waters 
the best duplicate for the big gray drake, and the 
Cahill tied on No. 10 almost a perfect imitation of the 
smaller fly. Queen-of-the-waters and Cahill were per- 
haps the best killing flie§ used on the trip. McGinty 
did not seem to do so well as usual, although it killed 
a great many handsome fish. Silver-bodied Montreal, 
the Alexandria, even silver-doctor and other gaudy flies 
sometimes raised fish, and these patterns were usually 
fished in large hooks, it being the universal desire to 
get rid of the small fry. In my own Ia«_t day's fish- 
ing, in which I killed a nice basket within the space 
of an hour and a half, I found queen and Cahill to be 
the favorites, the latter, perhaps, taking three-fourths 
of the honors over the next best fly, a slate-winged 
professor. The stream seemed to demand a fly with 
some yellow in it, most of the time. Green was no 
good. Indeed, I never have found green to be a very 
serviceable color in a trout fly, although many scoff 
at this proposition, citing the grizzly-king as a pro- 
nounced example to the contrary. We didn't find 
grizzly-king of any use on this trip. Queen, McGinty, 
professor and Cahill probably did most of the busi- 
ness, althought hat-bands at night time showed that 
many scores of other flies had been diligently em- 
ployed. What a sight, by the way, is an angler's hat, 
bristling with its many-colored flics. I came home in 
such a hurry that I hadn't time to remove my own 
"discards" from my hat band, and when I came to un- 
packing the hat at home it seemed so pleasantly rem- 
iniscent that I just hung it up the way it was, ready to 
begin all over again. 
A review of the doings of the Saginaw Crowd on this 
trip seemed to show that Mr. Davis was consistent 
high hook. On the different days that he fished he 
took, according to my notes, 23, 42, 27, 22, 15, and 12. 
His last basket of 15 was a very fine one indeed, and 
that on the day previous, 22, was the best basket of the 
trip, his fish being splendid ones on that occasion. 
Mr. Mershon fished one day less than Mr. Davis, tak- 
ing, respectively, 9, 20, 40 and 13 fish. Mr. Morley 
came next with 12, 15. 21, 8 and 8. Mr. Harvey fishe* 
two days, his basket being 7 and 5. Mr. Peter fished 
four days and took 7, 3, 5, and 7 fish. Mr. Harris, fish- 
ing two and a half days, took 11, 9, 19 fish. To my own 
rod I had 11, 8 and 21 on the different fishings. George 
King, head guide, took 13 handsome fish one day, and 
Harry, the camp major domo, broke away one evening 
long enough to catch 17 beauties, and I think had some 
trout the evening previous. The totals to the different 
rods foot up, as Mr. Davis' accurate records show: 
Mr. Davis 138, Mr. Mershon 82, Mr. Morley 69, Mr. 
Harvey 12, M. Peter 22, Mr. Harris 39» myself 40; 
George King 13, Harry 17. , ^ , , 
It should be remembered that the different rods fished 
different lengths of time, and it should always, of 
course, be noted that no one in the Saginaw Crowd was 
ever known to care whether the next fellow caught 
more fish than himself or not, although each may be 
counted upon to do his best throughout the day. As 
to the little fish, the sentiment was altogether against 
crowding the limit. The Saginaw Crowd needs no 
game warden, for, as one of their members remarked, 
"I expect any one of us is a better game warden than 
the State could hire to watch us." 
It was a great pleasure to be with these gentlemen 
once more in what I take to be the wildest portion left 
of this southern peninsula of Michigan, and on one oi 
the best streams now remaining. I do not think a 
pleasanter angling trip could have been enjoyed by any 
man, no matter how fortunate or happily situated. 
Trolley to Fox Lake. 
Mention is frequently made in these colurnus of the 
Fox Lake chain, much patronized by the Chicago ang- 
ling public. Good railroad access is had to-day at sev- 
eral different points on the Fox Lake waters, but the 
question is now on the establishment of a trolley line, 
which shall extend out Milwaukee Avenue, this city, and 
run clear through to a point on Fox Lake, not yet de- 
termined. In order to obtain this it is necessary_to get 
a franchise from the Chicago City Council, but this 
once granted the enterprise itself in all reasonable 
likelihood is destined to be completed within the next 
year or so. 
Some Tarpon. 
Mr. Oswald Von Lengerke writes this week that he 
had landed one tarpon of 140 pounds at Aransas Pass 
and that the sport was good. 
K Hough. 
Haktfosd Building, Chicago, 111. 
Acid Killing Tfotit in StjIKvan Cotinty. 
New Yokk, April 27.— There is on a Sullivan county 
creek with which I am familiar, a means of depopu- 
lat«ig the stream of which the law .should take cog- 
nizance and stop. I refer to the practice of the acetate 
factories discharging their sludge or waste fluids into it, 
thereby killing thousands of trout. It is a common occur- 
rence to see fine trout and even eels floating on the sur- 
face of the water, poisoned by the sludge. 
During the past few years numerous cans of fry and 
yearlings have been emptied into the creek, but this re- 
stocking cannot counteract the effect of the wholesale 
poisoning. Can it not be stopped? 
Fly-Fisher. 
A Beavetfcill TtouU 
A BROWN trout weighing five pounds and four ounces 
was caught on the Beaverkill fishing preserve near 
Beaverkill, N. Y., recently by Alex Voorhees. For an 
hour Mr. Voorhees fought the fish, which resisted all his 
efforts to land it and he was finally forced to kill it by 
striking it across the back with a club. This is probably 
the largest trout ever caught on the Beaverkill, with one 
exception, which was captured by E. F. Davidson several 
years ago and weighed five pounds and seven ounces. The 
trout was taken to Binghamton by W. S. Van Ostrom. — 
Ensign. 
The Florida season for turtle-egg hunting is now at 
hand. The Florida Times-Union reports that two hunters 
patrolled the North Beach at St. Augustine the other 
night and found ten nests, taking from them nearly a 
thousand eggs. They were disposed of readily this molii- 
ingj the hunters realizing ten cents a doeen for them. 
