FOREST AND STREAM 
Trout Prospects In Sullivan County 
376 
ing, the Brown Hackle, the Gray Hackle, the 
Brown Palmer and the Gray Palmer are all good, 
and of course the all-around favorite, the White 
Miller, should be included. Being an eccentric 
fish, the black bass is hard to understand. Ex¬ 
periments will teach you better just what flies 
they will take; and you can judge your casts from 
this. 
I will not go so far as to say that you can 
take black bass of the large mouth variety at any 
time of the season. I think that while they are 
in the shallows in the early summer they are 
best taken; from certain tests in this line I have 
found that then, and in the early autumn, they 
are sometimes easily caught by this method. It 
would be pleasing to know the experience of 
others in fly-fishing for the large mouth black 
bass. That this system will replace that of bait 
casting from a free reel, with the use of frogs, 
is open to conjecture. When sportsmen realize 
the value of it they will be glad to try it out. 
A good preparation for use as a means to 
keep the mosquitoes, black flies, sand flies, deer 
flies and such at a distance is made thus: Mix 
together pine tar and castor oil; enough castor 
oil to make the preparation in consistency to that 
of syrup. To this add a bit of carbon bisulphide, 
a concoction that is a direct insult to all winged 
pests. This preparation is at best disagreeable 
and it does not make one look like a haloed saint. 
But it is a good thing. It washes off very 
easily, the one good point in its favor. 
SAVING THE GAME FISH. 
Pickerel fishing through the ice in Ironde- 
quit Bay, Lake Champlain, is said to be better 
this year than it has been before in twenty years, 
and this is attributed to the efforts of the con¬ 
servation commission to clear out the carp, gar, 
or bill-fish, and dog fish, which eat the spawn 
of the game fish, as well as prey upon the finger- 
lings of bass, pickerel, perch and other finer fish. 
Last year the conservation commission licensed 
George Lindner, of Rochester, N. Y., to remove 
the destructive fish from the bay, and also per¬ 
mitted him to take fresh-water herring, better 
known as ciscos. For this work, Mr. Lindner 
and his men used a 400-foot seine with a three- 
inch mesh, and the net was drawn in about 
twenty feet of water, from May to December 31. 
The results of the hauls showed that there 
were a great many carp, dogfish and garfish in 
the bay, as well as a good supply of ciscos. Dur¬ 
ing the season it is estimated that 40,000 pounds 
of ciscos were taken in the seine, 26,000 pounds 
of carp of both the mirror and leather varieties, 
1,600 pounds of billfish and 900 pounds of dog¬ 
fish. 
CAPE SPORTSMEN ORGANIZE. 
The Cape Ann Fish and Game Protective As¬ 
sociation, with sixty charter members, has been 
organized at Gloucester, Mass., with the follow¬ 
ing officers: President, G. A. Johnson, Pigeon 
Cove; first vice-president, Amos H. Tanner, 
Gloucester; second vice-president, Edward 
Bailey, Pigeon Cove; secretary, Edward Babson, 
Lanesville; treasurer, Forrest C. Norwood, River- 
dale. Cape Ann is a popular region with sports¬ 
men, since the locality abounds in fox, coon, rab¬ 
bit, coot, plover, ruffed grouse, trout, pickerel, 
bass, perch, smelt and various other fur, fin and 
feather bearers. 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
Trout fishing in the Neversink River, Sullivan 
county, N. Y., from Hall’s Mill down, has won¬ 
derfully improved in the last three or four years. 
Some credit this condition to the later opening 
of the season the past few years, that is, May 1 
instead of April 1 or 15. This might look plausi¬ 
ble if there were not a better reason. Here it is: 
During the past six years 75,000 fingerling 
trout have been placed in the spring brooks 
above the covered bridge at Neversink village. 
Brooks were selected that carried sufficient water 
through the driest season, and in some cases 
they were screened at the mouth; this was done 
to prevent the young fish from getting into the 
main stream while too small to shift for them¬ 
selves. 
Of the 75,000, all but six or eight thousand 
were brown trout. As an experiment, two thou- 
The Unlocked Snow Water. 
sand rainbows were put in last year near the 
bridge, in addition to eight thousand browns. In 
June of this year the rainbows should be from 
four to six inches in length. While too small 
for the basket, I hope that if any are taken the 
fact will be reported to Forest and Stream. It 
will be interesting to note the result of this ex¬ 
periment. 
This stocking of what may be called the middle 
section of the Neversink represents no little labor 
and expense. Individual application blanks must 
be properly filled out for each thousand fish 
desired and forwarded to the commission. The 
trout are then shipped by the commission to 
Liberty, about seven or eight miles from Never¬ 
sink. 
Here the state’s expense and responsibility end 
and the citizen assumes the burden. A suitable 
team is hired, the fish taken to the Neversink 
and placed in the brooks, not the main stream. 
Each consignment for each brook is distributed, a 
few here and there, along almost the entire length 
of the brook. This is done to prevent crowding 
or bunching, and to ensure a larger supply of 
natural fool for all the fish. When thought ad¬ 
visable, the brook is screened. 
The men “behind the gun" at the Neversink 
end are W. Bruce Le Roy, John Mercer and Her¬ 
man B. Christian, as fine a trio of thoroughbred 
sportsmen as one would wish to meet and all en¬ 
thusiastic lovers of the “gentle art.” If you are 
on the Neversink this spring during the first half 
of May you no doubt will devoutly wish that 
every free stream in the state had three or more 
such men to stock it. 
Here are the conditions that have prevailed 
along the Neversink this winter: Plenty of water 
in the stream when the first freeze-up occurred 
in January. Ice started out during succeeding 
mild spell and piled up along sides of stream 
from four to eight feet high. Mercury has regis¬ 
tered as low as 25 below zero. Last cold snap it 
ducked 10 to 15 below for several days. First 
big snow was 22 inches. Four feet of snow on 
the level in the woods March 7. 
This looks like full springs and high water for 
early fishing. Full length waders will be fash¬ 
ionable. “Good luck” to you. 
W. L. HALL. 
THAT QUESTION OF FISH DISEASES. 
The question of whether diseases of fishes are 
communicable, which has been receiving much 
attention of late, should make of more than pass¬ 
ing interest the work of the Bureau of Fisheries 
along this line. In the annual report of Com¬ 
missioner H. M. Smith, just issued, the following 
information is given: 
“During the year the Bureau has received 
growing and insistent demands for the investiga¬ 
tion of various fish diseases and for the study 
of the relations of industrial and other contami¬ 
nations to the fish life in streams. These de¬ 
mands, which have come from Government, 
State, and private fish-cultural establishments, 
and from State, municipal, and private interests, 
are of a character that makes them entirely ap¬ 
propriate for attention at the hands of the Fed¬ 
eral fishery service; but, owing to the lack of 
facilities, the Bureau has been able to do very 
little to help either itself or the general public 
in this respect. 
“The co-operative investigation of cancerous 
tumors in trout, in which the Bureau has been 
associated with the New York Laboratory for the 
Study of Malignant Disease, has been brought 
to a close by the completion of a report dealing 
with the cause and nature of the disease and its 
relation to human health. This but clears the 
ground for that part of the work which vitally 
concerns the Bureau, namely, the investigation of 
the means of preventing and curing the disease in 
streams and hatcheries. The co-operating insti¬ 
tution is not concerned in this phase of the sub¬ 
ject and any constructive work in the interests of 
the fisheries must be conducted by the Bureau. 
“From every consideration of economy ade¬ 
quate means should be provided for such investi¬ 
gations. At one hatchery alone—Holden, Vt.— 
over 350,000 trout died from an epidemic in May 
and June. This was practically the entire stock 
on hand and the cost to produce these fish, to say 
nothing of their ultimate value, was greater than 
would suffice to pay for an assistant qualified to 
find means of prevention of the losses.” 
