May 14, 1904.] 
FOREST* AND STREAM, 
899 
Fishing Up and Down the Potomac 
Blue Ridge Rod and Goq Club. 
Harper's Ferry, , at the confluence of the Shenan- 
doah and Potomac rivers, faces the gorge m the Blue 
Ridge that permits their joint passage to the sea. Ihe 
mountains here, some twelve hundred feet high, are 
named Maryland Heights on the one side and Loudon 
Heights on the other, the thread of tke latter range 
forming the boundary line between Virginia and West 
Virginia. . ^, . 
A little further down the river splits an outlying 
range with a like gorge— the half on the Maryland side 
is South Mountain, the historic, and that m Virginia 
is called Short Hill Mountain. , c .1 
Lying between the Maryland Heights and South 
Mountain, in Frederick county, is an intervale called 
Pleasant Valley, and its continuation on the opposite 
side of the river bears the same name. Midway be- 
tween Loudon Heights and Short Hill, in the center of 
the valley, a knoll juts out to the river with an eleva- 
tion of nearly two hundred feet above the broken 
On this beautiful site the Blue Ridge Rod and Gun 
Club' built its home ten years ago. . The views in all 
direction are very pleasing; to the north lies Harpers 
Ferry, rising on its terraces to Bolivar Heights, and at 
night presents a charming panorama of twinkling lights, 
while south, beyond the South Mountain, through the 
gorge may be seen the hazy blue of the Catoctm range. 
The architectural and domestic arrangements ot the 
club are creditable and cozy. 
The stretch of water in front of the club house and as 
far down as the Catoctins, at Point of Rocks, _was for 
years one of the best in this great river. Too deep tor 
wading, too strong and broken for boating except with 
expert handlers, its very difficulty was a protection, and 
few localities of this great bass stream furnished better 
strings— as the records of the club will show, tor 
the last two vears no catch has been recorded for these 
waters, though not for lack of trying by many fisher- 
men—and the club numbers some of Washington s best 
anglers among its members. , ^ ^, • 
The cause is not far too sef>k. Standing on their 
lookout point on Saturday for the first time, the churn- 
ing waters, now clear and green, seemed an ideal pre- 
serve for the little-mouth bass. A second g ance, how- 
ever revealed the fact that the whole surface of the 
water was dotted with yellow shavings. A closer in- 
spection showed that the rocks and overhanging shrubs 
held drifts of them, the deeper water had not only the 
surface covered, but water-soaked shavings were being 
hurried along six inches to a foot under the surface 
and tumbling along the bottom. Pools that were once 
six feet deep are shallows now, where shavings have 
filled them up and freshets have partially covered these 
with sand. The curse is cumulative and the shavings 
are met with as far down as the mouth of the Moiio- 
cacy Occasionally a flood will tear out accumulations 
and carry them further, to be dropped again so that no 
deep water below is safe from this civilized outrage. 
At Harper's Ferry are a couple of pulp mills, one on 
the Potomac and one on the Shenandoah. These, it is 
said, use the mechanical process of grinding the pulp, 
and the fluid wastes are not offensive nor do they dis- 
color the water, and it would seem that but for the 
mechanical waste of the shavings no great harm would 
be done to the stream, the fish or the anglers by these 
enterprises. . . 
The difficulty of effecting a cure by negotiation is 
that so soon as the subject is broached, those inter- 
ested can see nothing but hostility to the pulp Jt" 
self, instead of the one feature of the shavings ihe 
proprietors enjoy the reputation of being honorable and 
high-minded gentlemen, the business gives employment 
to labor and trade in the locality, and to hint at burn- 
ing the shavings is interpreted to mean a threat at the 
institutions and is resented. It is unfortunate, for it 
would be so easy to avoid this great wrong without m 
the least disturbing the mills. 
The short logs, principally of poplar, are ground to 
a pulp, but the present method utilizes only the heart, 
and the sap-wood is first cut away with knives, which 
make a shaving such as country coopers make from 
barrel staves, and these are dropped in the stream as 
the easiest means of getting rid of them. 
This waste will be avoided later and the sap-wood 
will have a value, but just now this makes all the 
trouble It is simply a question of destroying this 
Avaste, instead of throwing it in the river. It could be 
easily burned, as is done with the waste of Canadian 
sawmills and some of our own. 
The appliances for this purpose would net be ex- 
tiensive and the fishermen could almost afford by con- 
tributions to put up the necessary funds, if no other 
way is open to relieve them of the pest and restore 
the fisheries now practically destroyed. 
It is said that the defense offered by the owners of 
the mill is that no harm is doiie to the fish, that their 
spawn may even be found upon the shavings. 
The first harm is interference with the tackle. With 
these shavings on the surface, no man could catch fish 
with a fly, if the river was full of fish, since every cast 
would engage the floating or catch the submerged shav- 
ings, to the destruction of his tackle, the disturbance 
of the fish and the wasting of his skill, by spoiling 
his cast. It would be sure to destroy his temper as 
well, and perhaps even threaten his religion. 
Casting bait is equally out of the question, and bot- 
tom fishing is not safe from interference by the flood 
of chips. 
The other harm is covering the bottom of the stream 
— especially deep pools, favorite haunts of the fish — 
with the shavings. These are long in decaying under 
water, but they do decay, and one cannot imagine any 
self-respecting bass keeping house in a marine wood- 
shed. The carpet of chips Idlls but the natural vegeta- 
tion along the river bottom; the absence of vegetation 
interferes with the natural plankton, the minute or- 
ganizations upon which the newly hatched fish must 
depend for sustenance, and the young fish are starved 
to death. 
The eggs of the bass stick tightly to whatever they 
may be dropped on, usually a little bowl of clean 
gravel. It is possible that spawn may be found fastened 
to shavings. After establishing the fact that the spawn 
was bass' spawn, and had not been placed there artifi- 
cially, it would be time to weep over the desperate 
condition of the poor abused fish that could find no 
other place to make its bed. As shavings are certainly 
the last place a bass would choose to nest, it would 
clearly establish how absolutely that locality must be 
'covered. 
There seems to be much doubt as to the rights and 
remedies of riparian proprietors on the subject of pollu- 
tion, and yet there is a long line of decisions under the 
common law proceedings in equity and the statutes — 
civil actions for damages and the extraordinary remedy 
by injunction. The courts have declared: "Riparian 
rights are founded upon the ancient doctrine of the 
common law. If the law is a progressive science, courts 
should keep pace with the progress and advancement of 
the age, and constantly bear in mind the wants and 
necessities of the people, and the peculiar conditions 
and surroundings of the country in which they live. 
In this connection it has been said to be one of the ex- 
cellencies of the common law that it admits of per- 
petual improvement by accommodating itself to the 
circumstances of every age, and applies to all changes 
in the moods and habits of society, and that in this 
respect it will never be outgrown by any refinements, 
and never out of fashion while the ideality of human 
nature exists. 
"The rights of riparian owners are well understood, 
and' there is a general concurrence of opinion in the 
courts as to the manner in which they must be exer- 
cised. The law on this subject is strictly in accord with 
the common sense and general convenience of man- 
kind. The owner of the land has a right to the use of 
a stream of water which flows through it for all useful 
and reasonable purposes. This use is not an easement, 
but is an incident to his property in the soil; a necessary 
inherent and inseparable portion of his ownership. But 
there is an equality of right in other riparian owners 
above and below him on the same stream; and from the 
necessary condition of the case, they must not use the 
water to the prejudice of each other's rights. 
"A riparian proprietor who uses the water of a stream 
in manufacturing white tissue paper is entitled to an 
injunction restraining as a nuisance the discoloration of 
the water preventing the manufacture of such paper." 
And just here is a tribute due one of the pulp mills 
at Harper's Ferry, which did restrain the washing of 
iron ore in the higher tributaries, on the ground it in- 
terfered with their industry. For this the anglers in 
these waters ought to be grateful. Ore-washing has 
killed the fish in many West Virginia streams, and the 
pulp mill did a good turn for us when it arrested the 
pouring of the loathsome, deadly sulphur waters into 
the Potomac. 
But the same right the pulp mill claims — to have its 
water uncontaminated by any foreign matter — it ought 
to grant to those below and render the water as it found 
it, free of the curse of chips. 
Another court has held that "whether knowledge of 
the effects of such deposits in a stream is necessary to 
be shown to constitute the defense of nuisance or not, 
when the pollution of the stream must necessarily be 
apparent to one engaged in making such deposits, he 
will be held to have notice of fhe effect of his acts." 
It is said that the mills are under a conditional pledge 
to abate the nuisance, and it is to be hoped this may 
be done without recourse to litigation, which is an ex- 
pensivduxury, and neajly always productive of an un- 
desirable friction. 
Some of the local anglers, pessimistically inclined, 
are not sanguine of any voluntary relief, as they assert 
that like promises have beep m^4e iVQXQ time to tim.e 
for several years, 
There is no bass stream in the world to equal the 
Potomac. At this point it is as beautiful as any trout 
stream of the Adirondacks or Canada. The adopted 
home of the small-mouth black bass, it has become 
naturalized here, and, like ourselves, has outstripped 
all creation. 
This stretch of water is now ruined, most of the 
fish destroyed, they can neither multiply nor live in this 
daily bombardment of poplar chips — and it would be 
so easy to keep the shavings out of the stream. 
If this were done, a few spring floods would clear 
out some of the haunts and it would be but a little 
while before the pools would again swarm with this 
king of inland waters. 
Not only would this justice bring happiness to many 
an angler, but the neighborhood would profit as well. 
When fishing at Harper's Ferry is good, not a week 
in the season that strangers do not come in, and the 
revenue they scatter is not to be despised. 
The mill is a benefit to the locality, but so are visitors. 
The hotels and stores, the stables and boatmen, and rail- 
roads, all share in the moneys distributed by the angler. 
The little State of New Hampshire is said to spend 
five million dollars in attracting and entertaining 
summer visitors, and to collect eight millions from 
these transitory guests. The parallel is a little short, 
iDUt it is there. Why not have the good of the mill 
and the anglers, too? 
There is every argument why these shavings should 
not go into the river — riot one reason, not one right, 
not one excuse, why they should. Henry Talbott. 
Fish and Fishing. 
No Spring in Canada. 
From Lake Edward I hear that the fishing is likely to 
open about the 15th or 20th of the present month. There 
is still a good deal of snow in the woods, so that despite 
the hot. weather already prevailing, the temperature of 
the water in the northern lakes is likely to be kept down 
for some time after the disappearance of the ice by the 
inflow of the snow water from the interior of the 
country. 
During the' latter part of May and the first half pf 
June more fish will probably be taken by trolling and bait- 
fishing than with the fly in the Lake Edward district, 
especially in the larger lakes. For trolling in Lake Ed- 
ward I have always found minnows to produce the best 
results, the artificial killing very well when the small 
fish themselves cannot be had, though there are generally 
plenty to be found in the shallows of the mdny bays of 
the big lake. 
The large trout of this lake are by no means averse 
to taking quite a big spoon, though it is a barbarous 
weapon upon which to impale these beautiful game fish. 
For all kinds of trolling in these waters during the first 
few days after the disappearance of the ice, the trout 
will doubtless be found fairly close to the surface. It is 
under these circumstances that the occasional kinking of 
the line forms one of the principal drawbacks to the 
pleasure of trolling. With fairly deep water trolling it 
is possible so to arrange the sinker as to prevent this an- 
noyance; whereas in trolling near the surface of the 
water it is customary either to do without a sinker at 
all or to make use of one altogether too light to afford 
the necessary zns inertice to resist the rotary motion of the 
bait, and to compel the swivels to act. Without this there 
is an insufficient resisting power in the leads, and the twist, 
instead of being confined to the trace below them, extends 
upward to the running line and produces kinking, while 
the leads cannot be materially increased in weight without 
rendering the tackle useless. The only satisfactory man- 
ner, therefore, of preventing the occurrence of the 
nuisance, is to hang the lead horizontally underneath the 
line instead of on it. It will be found that by changing 
the center of gravity, the resisting powe^ of the lead is 
for the purpose in question more than quadrupled, with- 
out a grain of weight being added to the tackle.- The 
proper action of the swivels is insured, and all approach 
to kinking prevented. 
Opening of the Maine Fishing Season. 
Maine, like Quebec, is anticipating a successful angling 
season, and for the reason given in this column a short 
time ago, namely, the late disappearance of the ice. Mr. 
Leroy T. Carleton, chairman of the Inland Fisheries and 
Garne Commission of the State, writing me on the 29th 
ult., says: "We have had a long spell of winter since 
the meeting here of the North American Fish and Game 
Protective Association; consequently the ice is late in 
leaving the lakes, and but few are as yet clear. Sebago 
Lake, near Portland, is one where fishing has commenced 
and many good catches are reported. We are hoping for 
a good season, however, as it is usually considered a 
good omen when the ice is exceptionally late in break- 
ing up." 
What Mr. Carleton says about anglers looking for and 
usually finding the best sport in those seasons which open 
^e latest if undoubtedly true of Canada as well as of 
