Aug. 18, 1906.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
261 
WEST CANADA CREEK-A TYPICAL ADIRONDACK TROUT STREAM. 
Photo by Dr. C. M. Hitchcock. 
by others in my presence were found to contain 
anything but the most immature semblance of 
spawn, coupled with every attendant circum¬ 
stance known to pisciculturists and ichthyologists 
that was calculated to prove the barrenness of 
the fish for the present season. Two months 
earlier in the season very much riper spawn had 
been found in some of the ouananiche frequent¬ 
ing Lake St. John in the month of May. Ap¬ 
parently, these fish are now ascending the rivers 
tributary to the lake, in which they will spawn 
next October and November. Then they will 
return to Lake St. John for the winter and 
perhaps for next summer as well. 
Next spring it may be the turn of the barren 
fish of 1906, now summering in the Grand Dis¬ 
charge, to run up the feeders of Lake St. John 
to spawn. All the fish now in the rivers are 
apparently supplied with well-developed milt or 
ova. The fish remaining in Lake St. John and 
in the Grand Discharge are evidently the non¬ 
spawning fish. Whether or not all ouananiche 
spawn but every other year, I am unable to de¬ 
clare, but it is perfectly certain that many of 
them are not annual spawners. More than this 
it is impossible to say at present, and scarcely 
more than this, it is safe to say, has yet been 
satisfactorily determined in regard to the spawn¬ 
ing habits of the Atlantic salmon—the bravest 
and the best of the many gallant descendants 
of the lordly ouananiche. 
Boston Salmon Fishermen. 
Most of the Boston salmon fishermen have 
been enjoying very good sport this season. Mr. 
Ivers W. Adams and party killed between four 
and five hundred fish on the Moisie, which con¬ 
clusively proves that under such well-regulated 
conditions as prevail in the mouth of that river 
the legitimate commercial netting of the larger 
estuaries is in no way injurious to the angling 
interests on the upper waters. There must, of 
necessity, however, be efficient supervision of all 
netting privileges, and I know one very promi¬ 
nent lessee of angling rights upon a river, the 
neighborhood of whose estuary is netted to 
some extent, who claims that it is rather bene¬ 
ficial than otherwise that this should be the case. 
But while there are a few of these very large 
rivers that can well afford nets not far from 
their mouths, and may even perhaps be bene- 
fitted by the removal of a certain number of 
the old and non-productive fish, the damage 
caused to most of the smaller Canadian salmon 
streams by over-netting is simply incalculable. 
Mr. Adams had as fishing companions on the 
Moisie this year two of his own sons, as well 
as Mr. Sampson, of New York, and his son. 
Mr. Louis Cabot, of Boston, has had splendid 
sport this year on the Grande Riviere of Gaspe, 
which yields him every year a number of fish 
weighing over 30 pounds each, the result of 
strict and careful protection and good guardian¬ 
ship. 
The Natashquan was fished this year by a 
number of Boston members of the Labrador 
Fish and Game Club and their friends. Among 
the anglers on this river were Mr. F. S. Hodges, 
the “father” of the club, Mr. H. F. Pickering, 
attorney, and Mr. J. Murray Kay. of Messrs. 
Houghton, Mifflin & Co., all of Boston; Mr. 
R. E. Plumb, of Detroit; Mr. Chapman, the 
well-known broker of 2 Wall street, New York, 
and the Messrs Johnson, of Johnson & Johnson, 
manufacturing chemists, New Brunswick, New 
Jersey. 
These gentlemen all enjoyed good sport, but 
complain very bitterly of the inaccessibility of 
the river and of the shortness of the season. 
And well they may. The fogs and other delays 
incident to navigation along the northern shore 
of Labrador are such that it is no unusual thing 
for anglers to be tied up several days at a time 
on the roast awaiting some means of getting 
back to civilization. Now, Natashaquan is 
nearly 600 miles below Quebec on the north 
shore of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, with prac¬ 
tically nothing but a wilderness lying between, 
at least so far as the country east of the Sague¬ 
nay is concerned. There is consequently but 
little inducement for regularity on the part of 
the coasting steamers, though Mr. James J. 
Hill gets over the difficulty very much by run¬ 
ning down to the St. John River on his own 
steam yacht. 
Character of the North Shore Rivers. 
One of the chief objections to the north shore 
rivers, from the angler’s standpoint, ; s the short¬ 
ness of the fishing season, due entirely to the 
character of the streams themselves. East of 
the Moisie, the interior of the Labrador penin¬ 
sula is largely a series of monotonous barrens 
closely resembling those of Newfoundland. 
These barrens seldom attain an elevation of over 
200 feet above the level of the gulf for a good 
many miles inland. The rivers that drain them 
fall "very nearly to 'he level of their estuaries 
by from one to four or five falls, and these are 
usually within a few miles of the sea. Sometimes 
there are falls which the salmon cannot ascend 
so near to the gulf shore that there is scarcely 
any length of angling water left. More often 
these falls are ascended by the spawning fish 
by means of a succession of ledges of varying 
heights. The vast extent of barren land through 
which the rivers in question flow causes their 
waters to spread over great wide stretches of 
territory, distributing themselves in such shal¬ 
lows that it is scarcely possible to ascend them, 
even in a canoe. After the subsidence of the 
spring floods, the June and early July sun beats 
so fiercely in these northern latitudes upon the 
shallow bed of the wide river stretches that the 
water becomes abnormally heated, losing but 
little, if any, of its extremely high temperature 
as it passes over the salmon pools below, un¬ 
less chilled by a continuance of cold rain or 
wind, which seldom occurs at that time of the 
year. 
Under these conditions, no experienced sal¬ 
mon fisherman will be surprised to learn that the 
angling season upon some of the north shore 
rivers frequently lasts no longer than from two 
to three weeks, and that there are still quite a 
number of otherwise promising salmon rivers 
flowing into the gulf from the eastern portion 
of the Canadian Labrador, ramaining unleased 
on the hands of the Government, and largely 
at the mercy of the netting men. One of these— 
the Esquimau or St. Paul—was secured some- 
years ago by Mr. James J. Hill, but abandoned 
by him after two seasons’ fishing. 
I took the temperature of the water in what 
is known as the Home Pool of the Natashquan 
River, on the evening of Friday, July 20, and 
found it to be 70 degrees, although the atmos¬ 
pheric heat was only 55. Since it is generally 
recognized that the salmon fisherman may hang 
up his rod when the temperature of the water 
reaches 70 degrees, it is not surprising that there 
were several days on the Natashquan in what 
should ordinarily be the height of the season, 
which yielded nothing but an occasional grilse. 
The night of July 20, however, brought a little 
rain, which lowered the temperature of the 
