372 
FOREST AND STREAM 
July, 1920 
m mi® Frans® 
alii: 
WHERE THE GAMY ROCK BASS HIDE 
THESE LITTLE GENTLEMEN OF RARE STREAMS AFFORD MANY A PLEASANT THRILL 
TO THE ANGLER WHO WOULD SEARCH FOR THEM IN THEIR .HIDDEN LAIRS 
By BEN C. ROBINSON 
I T is presumable that most of my read- 
ers are men who have had experience 
in big game fishing, both in fresh and 
salt water. They are pretty well ac- 
quainted with the thrill and the struggle 
of heavy battlers, but I wonder if there 
ever comes a time when they just seem 
to tire a little of the strain and the 
toil that comes with that sort of fishing. 
Personally I have had my share of the 
sport, and to me there oftentimes comes 
a desire to get away from the wide wa- 
ters and to hie back to some lonely little 
country stream where the shadows of the 
willows and alder thickets are densest 
and one can almost imagine that he is 
the sole surviving disciple of the Wal- 
tonian art. 
The larger and more widely known 
streams and lakes of the country in the 
fishing season fairly teem with the wield- 
ers of rod and reel. It is not this fea- 
ture, though, that I object to, for there 
is in the soul of every true fisherman a 
good wide streak of unselfishness and 
there is little doubt but that we all like 
to see the other fellow have as good a 
time on the open streams as we do our- 
selves, but this desire to get away where 
there is an absence of any form of hu- 
manity is refreshing at times. A man 
does not necessarily have to absent him- 
self from the horizon utterly and go 
packing into a wilderness a lifetime 
away from his home, but he can go to 
the kind of places I have reference to on 
a trolley, by some branch railroad or by 
automobile in the course of a few hours. 
You will find it restful to fish by your 
lonesome along a little stream. More- 
over it is something more than that, it 
is a rejuvenescence; it takes a man back 
to the bouyancy of youth. In fact I 
honestly believe that were we to heed 
that call of boyhood which so often 
makes itself felt in our everyday walks 
of life we would be better men, physically 
and mentally. Business at the best is 
a hard taskmaster and we all have our 
responsibilities which drive us deeper 
into the toil than is good for us. 
T HERE are a few things I would like 
to tell about these small streams 
and particularly about a fish that 
inhabits them. In all probability the 
fish I intend dealing with is as familiar 
to the reader as he is to the writer, 
nevertheless there might be some who 
have not made his acquaintance. 
He is known as the rock bass — a close 
brother to the more widely known and 
oft discussed black or small-mouth bass. 
Of a more rugged and sturdy build he 
has all the habits of the larger fish, 
takes about the same kinds of lures, feeds 
in a somewhat similar manner and fights 
his war on the rod and the barb in an 
equally vigorous if not so ferocious a 
way. With all due apologies to his big 
game brother, he is, pound for pound, a 
more vigorous and stubborn fish to han- 
dle. Give him the greater size of the 
black bass and I would not question in 
the least but that he would be the most 
sought after fish in our waters today 
by those who love the thrill and struggle 
of a hard battling, large fish. 
In shape of head and general build the 
rock bass does not differ radically from 
the heavier small-mouth, except that he 
is a great deal more strongly put to- 
gether. Instead of possessing the long, 
smooth lines of the small-mouth he is 
Where rock bass hide 
wide and thick, more of the dreadnaught 
type of fish. His average length is from 
five to six inches and I do not recall 
ever having seen a rock bass of more than 
9 inches in length although they are 
very often found to run around that size 
in waters where they are plentiful in 
number. A nine inch bass of this species 
will weigh close to a pound but I can not 
say that I have never taken the weight 
of any. A nine inch rock bass will meas- 
ure 4 Yz inches in width and is of good 
thickness, with heavy, strong tail and 
dorsal fin and spikes that verge close 
to the tail itself. He has all the snap 
and dash of the small-mouth and I firmly 
believe more of his pugnacity. It will 
not need long consideration for any one 
to see that this game fish of the small 
inland streams, favored as he is by the 
most wild and difficult water conditions 
is worthy of the fisherman’s most strenu- 
ous efforts! For his inches, for his 
weight and for his aggressiveness he is 
eligible to swim with the mighty ones of 
the streams and lakes. 
I have taken bass of this species from 
some of the larger pools in streams of 
small calibre where they had a fighting 
chance, that staged as good battles as 
any small-mouth bass would ever dare 
to. And again I have attempted to take 
them from other pools where the drift- 
age, the underwater log drifts and snags 
made it an ignominious defeat on my 
part. With their first strong rush, in the 
close quarters, to all sorts of under- 
water snags and drifts the fish will, un- 
less skillfully manipulated, place the 
angler’s featherweight tackle in serious 
danger of wreckage. In fact. there is a 
certain percent, of loss and breakage to 
be figured on by the rock bass angler. 
No matter how careful he might be, no 
matter how adept he might be in his 
understanding of the habits of this rare 
little gamester, it is bound to happen 
that some pugnacious, old King bass of a 
secluded and wild pool will outwit and 
bring him to grief. 
W HEN the rock bass is freshly taken 
from his natural element he is an 
extremely beautiful fish. The col- 
or of a large, normally well fed fish is 
a golden green — somewhat brighter in 
most cases than the small-mouth — with 
rib-like stripes of dark coming to the 
meridian line; tail and fins, dorsal and 
spikes are also of a darkish tint. The 
eyes are large, set well at the sides of 
