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KENDALL: NEW ENGLAND CHARES. 
to naturally unfavorable waters but many natural trout waters have been made uninhabitable 
for trout through artificial modifications, and from them the trout have gone or become very 
scarce, and in some instances both trout and waters have vanished before the “advance of 
civilization. ’ 
Its distribution is governed mainly by the temperature of the water, and in its natural 
habitat it seems not to endure a temperature of over 60° or 65° F. In many of the long settled 
portions of the country where the woods have been cut from the banks of the streams and 
surrounding country, the trout has practically disappeared. In the words of Dr. Henshall, 
which are a graphical expression of a well known fact: “The altered conditions of its aboriginal 
environment, owing to changes brought about by the progress of civilization, have resulted in 
its total extinction in some waters and sad diminution in others. In many instances the trout 
brooks of our childhood will know them no more. The lumberman has gotten in his work, — 
the forests have disappeared, — the tiny brooks have vanished. 
“The lower waters still remain, but are robbed of their pristine pureness by the contamina- 
tion due to various manufacturing industries. In such streams the supply of trout is only 
maintained through efforts of the federal and state fish commissions. It is hoped by tliis means 
the beautiful brook trout, the loveliest and liveliest of fish of all the finny world, may be pre- 
served and spared to us for yet a little while” (James A. Henshall in Favorite Fish and Fishing, 
1908). 
This article, as indeed most of popular trout articles, pertains to the trout as a “brook 
trout.” The trout, while naturally a permanent resident of many brooks and streams is also 
a resident of ponds and lakes, in some of which it attains a large size, even more than ten pounds 
in weight. The “progress of civilization” has also had its effect on the lacustrine trout. As 
the trout, whenever possible, ascends streams from ponds and lakes to spawn, the lumbering 
operations, by destroying the spawning places, have been fully as effective in the diminution 
of lake and pond trout as of the brook trout, especially in such ponds or lakes as have no 
suitable spawning grounds in them. 
But lumbering operations are not alone to blame for the disappearance of trout or their 
decrease in numbers. Excessive and untimely fishing are most destructive, particularly the 
catching of fish on their spawning beds and through the ice in the winter. Dr. Henshall, in the 
foregoing passage, expressed the hope that through fish culture this fish might be spared “for 
yet a little while.” It doubtless has in many streams and lakes, but fish culture is also respon- 
sible for its diminution in numbers, if not complete extinction, in some waters for the introduc- 
tion of more powerful and more voracious fishes has resulted in the great diminution of the 
native trout and which, together with or added to the ill effects of excessive and untimely fishing, 
has in some instances, at least, notwithstanding the efforts to maintain the stock by artificial 
propagation, almost completely exterminated the trout. 
