THE PISHING GAZETTE 
January II, 1893] 
CO N T E N TS. 
N.B.—All rif/hfs reserved in articles 'published in this 
paper. 
An Important Question to Fishing' Tackle Firms ... 10 
The Weather and the Scotch Salmon Fisheries ... 10 
Scotch Notes . 10 
The Key. Mr. Dryens’ Letter. HO 
Brixey Goes Salmon Fishing . 21 
The Dostrnction of the Thames Fi.sheries . 22 
Angling in Kent. 22 
Notes and Queries . 23 
The Book of the Roach . 21 
The Proposed New Thames Fishery Bye-laws ... 2.5 
The Manchester Sewage Scheme . 2C 
Stream Cleaning. 27 
Waltoniana... 27 
Correspondence. 28 
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(JisWnj 
SATURDAY, JANUARY 14th, 1893. 
AN IMPORTANT QUESTION TO 
FISHING TACKLE FIRMS. 
Sir, —May we, the undersigned, ask your assist¬ 
ance in the following matter, which is of the 
utmost importance to the whole of the fishing- 
tackle trade.® We have found out by experience 
that there are a certain number of individuals who 
evidently go the whole round of firms who advertise, 
drawing a supply of rods and tackle from each, 
never intending to pay, and, as they give a fresh 
address in almost every case, it is impossible to 
trace them, as the only information procurable is 
“ Gone ; no address.” If you will kindly consent 
to keep a list of names, which may be sent to you 
by anyone in the trade, open for reference by 
them only, of such defaulters, it would be of 
great service, and could not fail to put a check on 
such transactions. There are many persons of un¬ 
doubted respectability who thoughtlessly leave 
small accounts unpaid, or omit to give home 
address when away on a fishing trip. It must 
not be supposed that the above remarks refer to 
them in any way, but sometimes even this kind 
of forgetfulness in the case of amounts, small in 
themselves, but large in the aggregate, causes a 
great deal of unnecessary trouble.—Yours, &c., 
Francis M. Walbran, Leeds. 
W. J. Cummins, Bishop Auckland. 
G. Little and Co., London. 
Wm. Brown and Co., Aberdeen. 
[In the interests of our advertisers we are 
willing to keep a list such as is suggested, and 
hope it may lead to the conviction of some of the 
parties, who appear to make a living by robbing 
fishing tackle and other firms, AYe already have 
the names of several of them.— Ed.] 
THE WEATHER AND THE SCOTCH 
SALMON FISHERIES. 
By W. Murdoch. 
The salmon are by no means very frisky just 
now. Winter reigns with cruel and depressing 
severity. So far as run, it has jiroved the most 
rigorous experienced for many long years. It is 
now thirty-three years since the frost was so 
intense in several districts north of the Tweed 
as already this year it has twice been. At the 
time I write the salmon rivers of Scotland are 
nearly all completely frozen over from bank 
to bank throughout almost the whole of their 
length. It is now eleven years, dating from the 
present time, since they last were so completely 
blocked. This state of matters is very unwelcome 
to many. The season for spring salmon angling 
is fast approaching, and a month hence it will 
“be on” wherever there are rivers that have a 
run of spring salmon. But it will not, there is 
great reason to fear, be a great success at the 
commencement. As yet fish have bad really no 
chance of running inland. In the earliest rivers 
the great head of them run in January. Towards 
the end of December many of them push up in 
a few rivers when the weather is open and the 
water in fair going volume. But this past 
Deiiember they were elfectually kept from obeying 
their migratory instincts. Early in the month 
the frost became intense, and soon the rivers 
got utterly ice-bound, with the result, of course, 
that, except perhaps in Tay, the fish had no open 
run. Ice blocked the way, and continued to 
do so for nearly three weeks. A spate came 
thereafter, and the rivers for several days ran 
very high ; but the fish, according to reports I 
have received, did not run freely. The water, it 
was said, was too heavy and too cold to be 
readily encountered. When at length it ha(i run 
down to about the right size for the fish facing 
it, frost again set in, and ever since has steadily 
gripped. Tay’s and Loch Tay’s opening day is 
Saturday, but it will be Monday before angling 
begins. What sport will be got during the early 
days of these waters’ season is not for me to pre¬ 
dict. Only it may be remarked that weather 
conditions are, in the meantime, not at all favour¬ 
able. 
The Thurso, Naver, and Borgic in the far north 
opened for rods on the 11th (AVednesday), but, of 
course, nothing was done on them. Like most 
other rivers, they have not been open this winter 
more than a few days, since the time for the early 
fish running arrived. Hence they are still, even 
were they in angling gear, practically without 
clean fish to afford sport. 
It is to be hoped this terribly intense frost will 
not last much longer ; vast numbers of the late- 
run fish have yet to spawn, and spawn they can¬ 
not so long as it continues. From some rivers it 
is reported that not a third of them have yet 
succeeded in spawning out. Before the first long 
spell of frost but few indeed had got upon the 
redds—and in the interval between it and the 
coming on of the present protracted spell, 
although they were busy, but few completed 
operations, as bottom grue knocked them oft' the 
redds after they had been only a few days on. 
YORKSHIRE ANGLERS' ASSOCIA¬ 
TION. 
ANNUAL DINNER, 1893. 
The ninth annual dinner of Y’orkshire Anglers 
and their friends will be held at the Queen’s 
Hotel, Leeds, at 6 p.m. for 6.30 sharp, on Wed¬ 
nesday, Feb. i. Chairman, Cyril Ransome, M.A. 
A Grand Tobacco. —Mr. John Cotton, of 
Frederick-street, Edinburgh, has sent us some 
of his celebrated “ No. 1 Mild ” smoking mixture. 
It costs ten shillings per pound, but it certainly 
is worth the money. A very good salmon angler 
and all round sportsman, who first recommentied 
it to us, and who has smoked it for years, says : 
“ It is the coolest and best flavoured tobacco I 
have ever come against; you can smoke it all 
day long without burning your tongue.” AVith 
a canister of “ No. 1 Mild ” in our fishing case, 
we should feel quite comfortable when starting 
on a fortnight’s fishing expedition. 
19 
By Mac. 
Most of the Scotch salmon rivers still remain 
terribly choked up; up to Tuesday at any rate 
they were in that state. The more slow-flowing 
of them have all their pools sheeted over from 
bank to bank with ice, perfectly smooth, and from 
two or three to six or seven inches in thickness. 
Those that are swift running are choked with 
hardened “grue,” which, with the pressure, is 
piled up in many curious shapes. First the float¬ 
ing grue settled in some quiet pool, and then it 
piled on and on. From where it commenced in 
the several lengths of river it soon extended 
many miles inland. Thus quickly extending and 
filling up the gaps, it is no wonder that during 
the nearly three weeks time that the intense frost 
has kept hold, it has about completely put out of 
sight all the running water along the entire 
length of the rivei-s. Salmon have been wholly 
out of sight for over a fortnight. This is per¬ 
fectly true regarding them in every river north 
of the Tweed, bar the Tay and the Ness. 
Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday showed signs of 
freshening, off ami on, and on the whole they 
were milder, but though very hard, swift runs of 
water here and there began to throw off the frost’s 
grip, there yet was not a decided enough fresh to 
cause a general break up. 
Let us hope the thaw will hold, but that it will 
not prove sudden. Just now, a sudden freshening 
with a strong south wind would make an awful 
racket. There is such a weight and accumulation 
of solid ice and frost-hardened grue that, if it 
gave way of a sudden, it would sweep and plough 
up the spawn beds in a frightful manner. This 
cannot now bo averted except by meams of a very 
slow gradual freshening to melt a vast proportion 
of the ice and grue before the break up comes 
about. 
This year how do matters now look in view of 
the future.® AYe heard and saw a lot about the 
early salmon having a grand spawning time. 
Doubtless they had. But, it will be remembered, 
the rivers and streams were high at the time. 
Indeed, they were much too high considering the 
state they have been in for most of the time since 
then. For five weeks at least they have been 
lo'wer than ordinary summer drought level. 
From many rivers I have it on the best 
authority that for weeks the ova in the redds 
which many salmon were on in October and early 
in November must have been above water level. 
This means the utter loss of such ova. In many 
instances the water of late was surface level 
three or four feet lower than when the fish 
spawned. Then, too, it is reported from quite a 
lot of remote highland rivers that there was 
a great tearing-up of the spawn beds by the 
sudden ice flood of December. To those who 
understand these facts cannot but make it evident 
that a great loss has already resulted to the future 
of the fisheries. But, in addition, there is the 
now the most serious state of matters in regard to 
the autumn-run fish. They, by the frost being so 
severe as to cause the redds to be covered by 
bottom fast grue, have been kept from spawning. 
Since they were ripe for it they have scarcely 
had more than five or six days altogether for 
shedding their spawn. Before the first long spell 
of frost few of them had begun to spawn. Several 
days after it commenced those that were on the 
redds were driven off by the grue. After the 
flood, which succeeded at the end of about three 
weeks, vast numbers worked busily for a couple 
of days, but after that they were again driven off, 
and ever since have been kept off. If a thunder¬ 
ing flood—the result of a sudden thaw breaking 
up the ice, to crash and hustle along—came about 
there will most likely be a great scattering of the 
paired fish, and, as in 1881 (the last occasion 
when, after a spell of intense frost, the ice sud¬ 
denly broke up), very large numbers of baggits 
be found in the rivers after the rod season begins. 
Mr. Archd. Harper writes that he has proved 
from observation, and made doubly sure of the 
fact by having caught the fish after working, that 
the male does aSfeist in the digging of the spawn- 
