294 
July, 1922 
lakes of the Temagami Forest Reserve, 
District of Nipissing, Ontario, that 
weighed six and one-quarter pounds; 
with a length of twenty and one-half 
inches and a girth of fourteen and one- 
half inches. The statement was signed 
by three witnesses, the guide to Mr. Van 
Camp, the Factor of the Hudson’s Bay 
Post, and another gentleman. This is 
very interesting, but it is well known 
that some of the finest small-mouth bass 
fishing in the world is found in certain 
parts of Ontario and that some “mon- 
sters” of their kind are annually taken 
in that Province. 
W. J. Jamison writes me that it is 
his belief that most of the large small- 
mouths come from the lakes. It would 
seem so. The probability is that they 
have more of a chance there to add 
weight to themselves than in the streams 
where they keep in trim, firm-muscled 
and exceedingly keen, caused by a life 
spent in breasting the flow of the water. 
Even the large-mouth bass that hold out 
in such waters partake of the same 
physical characteristics. Indeed it is in 
flowing water that tlie large-mouth gives 
an exhibition of his fighting ability spec- 
tacular in comparison with the attempts 
of a lake bass taken from ordinary semi- 
warm waters. 
Another thing I have noticed : while it 
is not an easy matter to attract a large- 
mouth bass with fly and spinner in lake 
waters (strange as it may seem), in the 
flowing water where they hold out with 
the small-mouths they often take it with 
avidity. Shortly before I started this ar- 
ticle I received a letter from Charlie 
Stapf, a well-known guide at Prescott, 
Wisconsin, at the juncture of the St. 
Croix and the Mississippi. He states that 
excellent large-mouth bass fishing now 
occurs below the river mouth ; and that 
one can catch as high as fifty large- 
mouths a day in the Mississippi at that 
point. He writes: “We have had won- 
derful fishing below Prescott on the 
big river for the Rough-necks (large- 
mouths) this year. The U. S. Govern- 
ment is cleaning out the sloughs and 
driving the large-mouths back in the 
FOREST AND STREAM 
river, and it is now alive with them. 
While it is tame sport taking these on a 
fly compared with the small-mouths, it 
makes a big hit with the beginner with 
the fly.” 
Stapf, like so many anglers who class 
the small-mouth as America’s one and 
only game fish, can see nothing in the 
large-mouth; but it should be remembered 
that these northern waters are the very 
best of their kind for bass fishing. And 
so far as the St. Croix is concerned I 
can say that it is the finest and purest 
of any of the many waters I have come 
across. As a small-mouth river it shines 
as a glowing example — a river made up 
of springs great and small and is kept 
pure by permitting no pollution to come 
into it. 
^ O method of capturing the small- 
^ ' mouth can compare to that of using 
a fly-casting rod and some light lure, 
either the fly itself, or the bass fly in 
collaboration with a small spinner revolv- 
ing on a shaft. There is no sadder sight 
in this world than to see an angler going- 
after these gamy fish with tackle fitted 
for tuna and swordfish ; but it is also 
interesting to note that such clumsy and 
uncommendable tactics afford but few 
catches. The light tackle is the method 
for the small-mouth, and the large-mouth 
for that matter, and I hope that the 
time will come when the practice of 
using such light tackle on these wonder- 
ful fishes will be as common as that of 
using heavy tackle. 
There is something irresistible about 
the fly and spinner combination, for 
when it is worked in the water, by the 
wrist impelling the tip of the rod, it is 
all a-whirl and a-glitter ; an action, by the 
way, that is attractive enough to win any 
bass out of his shady nook. No matter 
how one tries he never can equal for 
attractive qualities this combination. I 
have used the flies themselves a great 
deal without the addition of the spinner 
and they have fallen flat. It seems to 
me that if one is to use the fly without 
the spinner it is best to add a couple of 
split shots up ahead of it on the leader 
to bring it down close to the bottom. 
The reason for this is that the bass may 
take it for some larval insect. But with 
the spinner and the fly it is different. 
Here it is the glitter that gives it the 
desirable animation; and no matter what 
the bass thinks about it he is so enthusi- 
astic about getting the affair into his 
mouth and digesting it that he loses track 
of time and space. At least that is the 
way I have found him to be. 
I have used all sorts of flies and spin- 
ners. Some have been useless ; some have 
been fairly good in practice, and at least 
two types of these flies and spinners have 
been everything that I could ask. My 
demands in the line of spinners are ex- 
acting. The spinner I prefer over all 
others is one that is not too deeply 
cupped and not too large in diameter; it 
is three-eighths of an inch wide at its 
widest point and five-eighths of an inch 
long. This is not too large, nor is it too 
small. If it were too large it would be 
liable to make the fish cautious and sus- 
picious. 
Although in the heat of the summer 
the small-mouth bass betake themselves 
to the deep waters, they will visit the 
in-shore waters to feed. In streams that 
have submerged rocks in the shallows in- 
shore they will be found there; for 
amongst the rocks, in the nooks and 
crannies they seek the helgramites and 
crabs and pursue the minnows. It is 
then that, rowing a boat some thirty 
feet from shore the man with the fly-rod 
casts in to them, spotting every likely- 
looking pocket and back-swirl that ap- 
pears tempting. Often I have cast the 
fly and spinner so that it has practically 
fallen on shore and I have had a bass 
time and again take it before it had 
travelled out into the stream a foot. 
Often a swirl may be noticed in a pocket 
which will denote a bass feeding, and the 
fly and spinner dropped in an advantage- 
ous position -will bring a strike the mo- 
ment it lands — or very nearly so. In fish- 
ing a stream the shore-line should be 
studied; the good places picked out. In 
this manner one can row from one place 
to another and waste no time on water 
that never turns up a fish. 
There are some places that never fail 
to have a fish in them ; for when one is 
taken out, another will take his place. 
These places should be approached with 
due caution while remembering that it 
is the first cast into a spot of this sort 
that gets the fish, or the second time at 
the most. Along with this fact note 
should be taken when is the best time 
to find them in these nooks. It may be 
early in the morning, or it may be in 
late afternoon, growing on to dusk. Of 
all times I vastly prefer fishing for the 
small-mouth around the hour of dusk, and 
this is particularly true after a day of 
great heat when, during the greater por- 
tion of the day, they have been in the 
deeper water, but at nightfall come in to 
feed. For my part I believe the evening 
fishing to be the very best ; and some of 
my largest small-mouths have been 
caught when it was so gloomy that I 
was hardly able to see the fly and spinner 
drop into the water. 
The Stone House, a landmark on the lower St. Croix 
