July 19, 1913 
FOREST AND STREAM 
77 
North Carolina Trout Fishing. 
Hendersonville, N. C., June 20. — Editor 
and Stream: As yet I have not taken my fish¬ 
ing trip to Jackson county to fish Chatooga River, 
but have just returned from a delightful day’s 
fly-fishing on one of the most beautiful trout 
streams in our mountain country—Davidson’s 
River. 
Over forty years ago I used to fish this 
stream and killed many brook trout. Of recent 
years the rainbow trout have been planted in 
this stream, and the brook ( Fontinalis ) have 
nearly disappeared, except in the small tribu¬ 
taries and upper reaches of the river. 
Through the courtesy of the general man¬ 
ager of the estate I obtained a permit to fish this 
water, and to take a friend with me. This 
friend very kindly offered to take me in his 
auto as soon as we took up the matter of when 
to go and where to stop. So on Tuesday I 
boarded No. 9 at this place and he met me at 
Arden Station with his machine and took me 
home to lunch. At 3 p. m. we started in his 
machine for Neills’, five miles above Pisgah 
Forest, arriving there at about 5 p. m. We 
killed half a dozen fish late in the afternoon for 
breakfast and got everything in readiness for an 
early start Wednesday a. m., and about 7 o’clock 
were off up stream. My friend suggested that 
he go up stream, and I fish up till we met, and 
this we kept up till 12 m. Then we stopped 
for our midday lunch and to dress our fish. At 
1 p. m. we again began fishing, but just then 
thunder began to be plainly heard in spite of the 
rush of water, so we returned to the cabin in 
time to avoid the storm. It proved to be more 
of an electric storm than a rain storm for the 
moment. We began to count on big rainbows 
for the late afternoon. It was a miscount. 
We took an early supper so as to have the 
late hours with the trout after the electric dis¬ 
play was over. We got in the stream and found 
the trout quite ready for their evening meal of 
flies, and quickly stowed three nice ones in the 
creel. Then down came the rain and more thun¬ 
der. We were wet through and had to give it 
up. I lost my best fish just before leaving the 
river—not well hooked. 
But the largest of the trip was a beauty. 
It struck heavily in a long deep pool close under 
a ridge side, and at once leaped some three 
feet out of the water and again a rush and high 
leap. 
The water was swift under the mountain, 
and he rushed into this deep swift water. I 
feared to give more line, because of snags, and 
had to try and hold all I had. Evidently the 
hook was not fixed in tough tissue, and he 
broke loose. The taut line suddenly slacked; 
he had escaped. I only had the satisfaction of 
knowing I had done my best under difficulties, 
and it was “better to have hooked and lost than 
never to have hooked at all,” anyway, and so I 
was quite philosophical about it. Later I took 
the largest fish of the trip from this pool, but 
far from being the “big one.” This one made 
a good fight, but not the spectacular fight of the 
“big one” that got away. 
Much of the pleasure of such outings depends 
so largely on who is your fishing or outing com¬ 
panion ; and my friend, G. W., was just such a 
sportsman as does all possible to make an out¬ 
ing all it should be. We left Neills for the re¬ 
turn home at 7 a. m. Thursday. 
We stopped unintentionally on the logging 
railroad track a hundred yards from Neills’ 
just as the logging train was due there. We 
flagged it, and the boss, who had some twenty 
or more men on board, rushed to our aid, and 
we were over and off again in five minutes. 
And what a delightful run home it was in 
the early morning, too! In the valley of the 
French Broad the mist hung low; and the grass, 
in fact all things green, was wet with dew (not 
the dew called mountain dew that oft-times 
makes for trouble), the sun just breaking 
through here and there. To attempt to describe 
our beautiful mountains is something beyond me, 
but I can say that those who have never taken 
an auto run through one of these beautiful val¬ 
leys on an early June morning can form no 
idea of what it is. It must be seen. But how 
about trout? We killed forty-six, returning all 
small fish to the water, of course. Only “hog 
suckers” keep them. Ernest L. Ewbank. 
Tuxedo Trout Season. 
Tuxedo Park, N. Y., July 8. — Editor Forest 
and Stream: The fishing for trout and salmon 
at Tuxedo Lake is practically over for the sum¬ 
mer, or at least until the cooler weather in Sep¬ 
tember brings the fish nearer the surface, and 
allows the use of lighter tackle than is neces¬ 
sary at present. 
Most of the members of the club have re¬ 
sponded most heartily to the request of the fish 
committee that all fish taken be registered, and 
not only has an almost accurate record been kept 
of the number taken, but in nearly every instance 
a note has been made of the lure used in cap¬ 
ture. We find in looking over this record for 
the months of May and June that over 2,000 
steelhead trout, ouananiche and chinook salmon 
have been brought in by 400 fishing boats taken 
from the club boat house. This is an average 
of five fish for every boat that went out for 
the purpose of angling, and the average time 
each boat was out was two hours. Of the 2,000 
fish taken, 25 per cent, were caught with the 
artificial fly. The predominating patterns of 
flies used were hare’s ear, brown hackle, light 
cow-dung and black gnat, tied on 10 and 12 
hooks. A small double-bladed nickle spoon, 
rigged with single hook and baited with worms 
was found to be the most successful trolling 
lure. The ouananiche was feeding almost en¬ 
tirely on natural flies upon or near the surface, 
and of course most of those taken with the fly 
were of this species. The steelhead and chinooks 
ranged deeper, and only toward evening would 
these fish follow the hatching May flies to the 
surface of the water. Although this lake is 
deep and cold and seems ideal for the introduc¬ 
tion of frost-fish or smelt as a food supply, our 
efforts so far in planting these fish have proved 
futile. 
Two different lots of Adirondack frost-fish 
and one of smelt in consignments of half mil¬ 
lion each were planted in the mouths of the 
brooks running into the lake, but none have been 
seen since. I wonder if any of the readers of 
Forest and Stream could give me any informa¬ 
tion as to how most of the Northern lakes have 
been stocked with these fish? Were adult fish 
used for this purpose, or the eggs or fry? 
W. M. Keil. 
Massachusetts Game Legislation. 
Springfield, Mass., July 9. — Editor Forest 
and Stream: We hunters and inland fishermen 
of Massachusetts have been following a false 
scent and “barking up the wrong tree” so long 
in our futile efforts to obtain constructive legis¬ 
lation for the adequate restocking of our de¬ 
pleted covers and waters that we have come to 
be the laughing stock of every professional poli¬ 
tician and legislation from Barnstable to Berkshire. 
To effect the enactment of any given legis¬ 
lative measure, one at least, of the following 
propelling forces are vitally essential, viz.: the 
power of unanimous public sentiment, the power 
of a well-disciplined lobby backed by corporate 
interests, or the power of an organized voting 
constituency. Legislative measures calculated to 
improve conditions inland fish and game-wise in 
Massachusetts lack the backing of any one of 
these given forces, hence our miserable failures 
of the past. 
For a quarter of a century or more we have 
neglected our duty, and allowed our commis¬ 
sioners to go yearly on bended knees and prac¬ 
tically alone, before our varying legislative 
bodies, praying for miserly appropriations with 
which to patch up isolated and dilapidated hatch¬ 
eries instead of having placed ourselves in a 
position where we could insist upon and obtain 
the enactment of a bill giving us the legal right 
to contribute to an approximate annual fund of 
$200,000 through the medium of a combination 
hunter-fisherman license law, so framed as to 
assure the use of the money for the purposes in¬ 
tended and created. 
The public does not yet fully realize, from 
a food product standpoint, the economic value 
of restocking our depleted waters and covers. 
Neither have our legislators paused to consider 
the question from the viewpoint of its being a 
factor in the conservation of human health as 
an incomparable incentive for getting people out 
of doors and into closer touch with the rare 
environments of nature. In fact, the question 
of inland fish and game conditions has too long 
been generally regarded as one of very second¬ 
ary importance and Worthy of no particular con¬ 
sideration. 
