294 
FORES T A X I) S T R E A M 
June, 1920 
rondacks in twain, was the point of entry 
into the Morehouseville section, Piseco, 
Jock’s and Spruce lakes, and with cer- 
tain Adirondackers like the venerable 
Chapman — Wilson party, the West Can- 
ada Lakes, as well as a vast area of in- 
termediate territory, in those days and 
even to the present time was all mighty 
good trout and deer country. 
The basin of the reservoir occupies the 
valley of the West Canada Creek to an 
extent of eight or ten miles to northeast- 
ward of the dam. At the lower east ex- 
tremity Black Creek enters and contrib- 
utes an off-shoot to the reservoir up the 
valley of this latter watercourse. While 
these two inlets are the principal feeds, 
with the West Canada supplying much 
the larger volume of water, numerous 
lesser tributaries, like the main sources 
noted trout streams, enter on every side. 
The fish of these various creeks and 
brooks which constitute the natural plant- 
ing of the reservoir are — or at least up to 
last year were — entirely of wild charr 
stock. 
The sites of former woodlots and hill- 
sides, isolated farms and diminutive ham- 
lets lie submerged beneath the surface of 
the newly formed lake. Half way up 
the reservoir, spared from the devastating 
inundation, a few scattered habitations, 
Will Light’s small hostelry and the little 
detached library of curious octagonal 
design, whence from the pen of Raymond 
Spears proceeded pleasing descriptions of 
Adirondack — and other scene and inci- 
dent, lend a scant semblance of the one 
time busy village of Northwood. Toward 
the head of the reservoir and beyond its 
environs as the Adirondacks proper are 
approached, here and there occur 
weather-beaten farm houses, which col- 
lectively, together with the little clump 
of dwellings long termed Wilmurt, have 
made up the sparse settlement of the up- 
per valley for a half-century and more. 
The environment is primitively rural 
rather than of wilderness aspect, with 
characteristics of the threshold of the 
backwoods. 
As the construction of the reservoir 
has been for the purpose of supplying a 
feeder to the new Barge Canal system, 
there are, unlike the Ashokan, virtually 
no restrictions with respect to the fishing. 
Frank — my companion on the drift 
In consequence of this and the further 
fact that the valley hereabouts, now 
flooded, had always been famous for the 
quality of its trout streams, the reservoir, 
despite its brief existence, has become a 
popular trouting resort. Here early of 
Sunday mornings the honk of incoming 
automobiles, heavily burdened with an- 
glers from towns and cities in the Mo- 
hawk Valley fifty and more miles distant, 
greets the resident fisherman already 
squatted on a favorable cutbank for the 
day’s recreation. Local seeker of trout 
and motorist alike seem in general of 
bait-fishing proclivities. The visitor with 
his fly “pole” no less than the native with 
bamboo sapling listlessly whiles away the 
hours in this crude employment, proffer- 
ing a gob of nightwalkers from the hooli- 
gan at his side to the thoroughbred trout 
of the West Canada when the fish crave 
the fly. The only exceptions to this plug 
fishing that we observed were an angler 
from Hinckley and his neighbor, the vil- 
lage blacksmith, formerly a Honnedaga 
guide, whose devotion to the fly in the 
cold, swirling rifts atoned to some extent 
for the unwholesome ways of their fellow 
fishermen. 
T HE West Canada Creek after its 
egress out of Mud Lake of the West 
Canada chain of lakes, wends its 
devious way, augmented in size as it pro- 
ceeds by the entrance of innumerable 
brooks and outlets of lakes, in a series of 
falls, stillwaters and rifts down its 
mountain pathway and enters the reser- 
voir at the head of the basin. The last 
half-mile of its course consists of a deep, 
slow flowing pool, into which discharges 
a fine rift of a little less in length. Be- 
tween pool and rift is an ancient fording 
place, immediately above which in later 
years the stream had been crossed on the 
old Mackintosh Bridge, now replaced by 
an iron structure. It was on the south 
bank of this pool a little back from the 
creek in a clump of bhlsams and second- 
growth spruces that our tent was pitched. 
Having disposed of our first meal in 
camp we washed dishes, provided night 
wood and performed a few other neces- 
sary chores and then gathering tackle and 
the light rods we made our way to 
the creek and took stock of conditions. 
The stream was bank high and roily from 
recent heavy rains ; fly-fishing here being 
out of the question we entered the boat 
and dropping down into the reservoir 
rowed to the mouths of several streams 
picking up a nice trout here and there on 
the wet fly. The ^fternoon was spent in 
this way. Having finished supper, while 
Frank busied himself around camp, I 
crossed the creek in the boat and em- 
ployed the remaining daylight in casting 
with the dry-fly in a small channel on 
that side. My efforts were made fruit- 
less by the high and turbid water, how- 
ever. 
After a five o’clock breakfast the next 
morning I was for dry-fly fishing the 
creek, regardless of its high state, but 
Frank dissuaded me from this purpose, 
rightly urging that the stage of water 
then existing would render such an under- 
taking fruitless. So at his solicitation we 
headed down the reservoir to a submerged 
brook on the east side, wet-fly fishing as 
we came to promising localities with fre- 
quently a good sized trout brought to net. 
Arriving at a point where the tributary 
originally had discharged into the West 
Canada we landed and cast from the 
former bank, covering a hundred yards or 
so of the old course of the brook. The 
water thereabouts varied from twenty to 
thirty feet in depth and the trout there- 
fore rose poorly to the fly. Frank was 
of the belief that the largest fish in the 
reservoir were to be found here and he 
determined to get them in one way if not 
in another if it were at all possible, so 
he caught some shiners and went down 
to bottom for the trout. His returns did 
not prove to be commensurate with his 
expectations, although there was a degree 
of encouragement in the taking of a 
couple of one pounders. He was sure that 
the big fish lay out in a bend of the old 
bed, a distance of seventy-five feet or 
more, beyond the reach of his fly-rod, and 
the boat offered no aid as it was without 
an anchor rope of sufficient length. 
Heretofore I had always been among the first to brave the mountain waters 
