6i8 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Oct. 20, 1906. 
ever may be said of your correspondent Mr. 
Crane, it is apparent from the admissions made 
by Mr. Carroll in his retraction concerning Mr. 
Notman, that he feels amply justified in circu¬ 
lating in public print slanders and libels con¬ 
cerning others purely upon the basis of hearsay, 
and though he has no knowledge of the actual 
facts. He invests himself with judicial office, 
and if his informants appear to him truthful, he 
deems himself justified in spreading broadcast 
libelous characterizations founded only upon 
such hearsay reports. He refers to himself as 
the “innocent” cause of circulating the state¬ 
ments, and admits that he has been guilty of 
“maligning a perfect stranger,” he himself being 
“deceived.” 
1 desire only to add that it may not be long 
before both of your correspondents find that the 
excuse of not having originated a libel will not 
serve as any defense in a court of law, and that 
the courts do not regard their misstatements as 
“innocent.” J. F. Muir. 
From the BeaverkiSI. 
The habits of trout appear to vary a good 
deal; some are home lovers and may be seen 
day after day in the same place; others are fond 
of travel. They come up from below on a push 
of water, remain a short time in the big pool 
and pass on up stream. There are not many 
places where the trout can be observed at all 
times, but it is very instructive to follow their 
movements where it is possible to do so. For 
one thing we learn how necessary it is to fish a 
■long piece of water thoroughly, not skipping 
even the shallow side's and unlikely places. The 
fish may be anywhere in the pool, and the larg¬ 
est of all may be on the lookout for minnows or 
other food in dead water only a few inches deep. 
Again they are lying in the center, or at the tail 
of the pool, or in the swift water at the upper 
end. They may be hidden under rocks, or, in 
hot weather, lying like dead things on the bot¬ 
tom, scarcely moving gills or fins. In the last 
position they are sometimes indifferent to every¬ 
thing about them, and may be approached with¬ 
in a few feet. I have actually touched several 
with a stick before they darted away. They ap¬ 
pear to be asleep, or in a trance or comatose 
state. 
Sometimes a big fish will cruise along the 
edges on the shallows. They may be too lazy 
to catch the minnows, but are satisfied when they 
have frightened them nearly out of their wits. 
The last time I saw a trout doing this, it fol¬ 
lowed the minnows into water only two or three 
inches deep, yet made no real effort to catch 
one. I know from previous observations that 
it could have taken them if it was hungry and 
in earnest. 
Judging by these notes made from the high 
bank of a long pool of no great depth, I should 
say that on a stream fairly well stocked with 
trout, it is scarcely possible to fish too slow 
or to be too careful to keep out of sight of the 
sharp eyes of the trout. I have seen men wad¬ 
ing where they should be casting their flies. 
Nothing spoils sport for the angler who comes 
after one like deep wading. This is one reason 
why we would rather fish after a good fly-fisher 
than a man who is using bait. The latter is apt 
to wade deeper and alarm the trout more. It 
is of no use to fish for trout on the surface 
when they are hidden away under rocks and 
in the deepest holes. The only thing to do is to 
sit down, smoke a pipe and take it easy for at 
least half an hour. The larger the stream the 
sooner the trout recover from their fright. I 
sat on a rock near the Neversink, on one oc¬ 
casion, and allowed nine men to pass me. They 
were all in a hurry to take the stream first, and 
I had gone out to fish, not to run a footrace 
over rocks and through the water. After a good 
rest, I fished after the progressive ones, going 
very slowly, and had quite a satisfactory day 
of it. On a small brook the probabilities are 
that I would have caught nothing, except a few 
baby trout. 
I am convinced that brown trout and rainbow 
trout can endure higher temperature than our 
own fontimlis, and think that the introduction 
of the first-named into so many of our eastern 
waters was very wise, particularly in the large 
streams, which nowadays become so warm in 
summer. Our climate seems to have changed 
considerably in the last twenty years. It is 
warmer at the north, colder in the south. When 
I lived in Florida, many years ago, there was 
an absolute frost line, below which tropical fruit 
trees were safe. Since that time killing frosts 
have occasionally extended down almost to the 
end of the peninsula. 
The past summer in Sullivan county has been 
the warmest I have ever known, and the humid¬ 
ity has been much greater than usual. Possibly 
some scientist may be able to tell us why the 
prevailing winds have been from the southeast 
instead of from the northwest. Southerly winds 
are favorable to the fly-fisher in this section as 
long as the water is reasonably cool, .but there 
is nothing I hate so much as luke-warm water 
GONZALO POEY. 
Treasurer of the Anglers’ Club, of New York. 
in a trout stream. However, we must take the 
rough with the smooth, and be thankful when we 
can be anywhere near water in which there 
is a possibility of finding a rising trout. 
After all, it is largely a question of size and 
shyness. I have been happier over the capture 
of three large trout than I would have been 
with a basketful of small fish. 
When we are obliged to use small flies and 
fine gut, the fishing is more interesting and ex¬ 
citing. Some years ago I read the autobiography 
of an old angler who had never used a gaff or 
net in landing salmon. He considered it un¬ 
sportsmanlike to mar the beauty of the fish; but 
he must have lost many that were lightly 
hooked, in playing them to the point of ex¬ 
haustion before stranding or taking them out by 
gripping just above the tail. He wore a lisle 
thread glove to give a better hold. It would not 
be possible to take trout by the tail grip, as they 
are not formed in the same way as the salmon; 
but where it is possible to do so, I find it more 
exciting not to use a net. One may have to 
take a large fish a long distance down stream to 
find a suitable place to land it, and it is certainly 
exasperating to lose a big one that a net would 
surely have saved. 
In my experience no fish is more dangerous 
than a lazy one. Some of these beggars come 
right along or swing in to your side of the 
stream up into shallow water, then bear slowly 
and heavily away. They do not really tire, and 
may be galvanized into sudden life and action 
at the last moment. However, there were not 
many poky trout this season. Most of them 
rushed up stream the instant they felt the hook 
and fought desperately until completely played 
out. 
I am surprised that more women do not go 
a-fishing. I find that, given* the opportunity, 
many women are interested in the sport, par¬ 
ticularly in fly-fishing. In fact, they are en¬ 
thusiasts when they do take to it. Casting from 
a boat or canoe is easiest, but a woman can 
wade, if she wants to, just as well as a man. 
The best chum I ever had in fishing was a girl, 
and she tramped just as hard and fished quite as 
patiently as any man I ever knew. 
Theodore Gordon. 
Beaverkill, Sullivan County, N. Y. 
Red Drum and Sheepshead. 
Galveston, Texas.- — Editor Forest and Stream: 
The wonderful success of the experiment of 
planting striped bass in the Pacific, has suggested 
the possibilities of a planting of the gulf redfish. 
Atlantic authorities have in answer to this sug¬ 
gestion said we have the redfish in the waters of 
the Atlantic, and it is an almost worthless fish, 
coarse and stringy. The gulf ports, especially 
Galveston, have fish markets that show a range 
and quality of edible fish that is not surpassed, 
if equalled. If it was put to a vote of the fish 
eaters here, I think it would be found that the 
people who buy the best in the markets would 
say that as a fried, boiled, baked or broiled fish, 
the redfish of from two or five pounds weight 
would be their choice if they could have only 
one fish the year round. Pompano, Spanish mack¬ 
erel and salmon are fish that any one would 
tire of if put before them every day for a month, 
but the redfish is as staple as a potato, and can 
be eaten with a relish every day of the year. My 
recollection of boyhood days on the Chesapeake 
Bay is that the redfish (red drum of those 
waters), are never found under ten or fifteen 
pounds weight, oftener twenty-odd pounds, and 
are but the stray bull redfish of the gulf; that 
whether caught in gulf or Atlantic they are old, 
tough, strong and rank in taste; at fifteen pounds 
or over, up to thirty-five pounds, they are only 
fit for chowder, but make good chowder. 
I would like to know from Atlantic coast fish¬ 
ermen whether the red drum breeds on the At¬ 
lantic coast or in the bays and estuaries of the 
bays as they do in the waters tributory to the 
gulf. Recently a party of seven caught 157 red¬ 
fish at Paper Grove reef, near Galveston, in Gal¬ 
veston Bay in two or three hours, that weighed 
from 1V2 to 2j/j pounds apiece, and a few days 
later, at the same place—I was one of the party— 
four men caught twenty-seven, the largest about 
5 pounds. I am taking it for granted that the 
red drum and the gulf redfish or channel bass, 
as it is sometimes called on the Florida coast, 
are the same. } 
Has the red drum a black spot on his tail 
about the size of a dime, sometimes larger, oc¬ 
casionally two or three black spots on its tail? 
If there are no small red drum in the estuaries 
of the Atlantic coast, it is an interesting ques- 
ton, why not? The commonly received belief 
on the Texas coast is that the very large, over 
fifteen pounds, redfish are all “bulls,” and they 
are so called. By the bye, I caught a seventeen 
pound “bull-red” recently, and the way he made 
my reel hum off and on for twenty minutes would 
have done credit to any fish of his weieht. 
As far as I am advised the sheepshead is 
another fish that is only known in Atlantic bays 
as a stray from the gulf. Has any one ever caught 
a sheepshead in the waters tributary to the At¬ 
lantic so small as to make it probable that the 
sheepshead breeds there? The waters of Galves¬ 
ton bay swarm with small ones, and curious to 
say, they never grow in our waters as large as 
they do in the Chesapeake or the bays of the 
Jersey coast. Eight pounds is about as large as 
ever T saw one from the gulf. I have known 
them of double that weight in the Chesapeake. 
We know as yet so little about salt water fishes 
and their habits, that I take it for granted that 
an exchange of facts as to them from different 
sections of salt water coast will be found not 
without interest to many. 
Recentlv a narty of five of us caught six black 
drum while fishing for salt water trout. These 
