512 
planted about a dozen pairs of ring-neck peas¬ 
ants in the mountains a couple of years ago and 
they are doing fine. Such winters as the one 
just passed, with a little care and protection, we 
believe will give them a start that will mean much 
to us. It is hard to tell at this time how they 
will develop, but we are going to give them all 
the opportunity possible for becoming acclimated 
and increasing. 
We have had splendid chicken shooting the 
last few seasons, and believe there are more 
chickens, including the pinnated and sharp tail 
grouse, than ever before. Duck shooting is not 
so good, the last three or four seasons having 
been so dry that the feeding grounds in the 
Mouse River have become dry as an onion bed, 
and our ducks seem to have taken a course far¬ 
ther east. But “Boys, oh boys,” what a place for 
duck the old Mouse River was a few years ago, 
a paradise for the fellow that loves the sport. 
But the Government is putting a dredge through 
old grounds now, so as to provide more hay and 
pasture for the farmers’ cattle, which may be 
more practical, but nevertheless it will forever 
spoil one of the greatest duck marshes I ever 
shot over. 
HENRY W. PETERSON. 
TROUTING IN THE CATSKILLS. 
The trout fishermen of the Catskills have taken 
to the streams. With their renowned optimism 
they refuse to be discouraged by the backward 
season, the swollen, roilly streams and the low 
temperature, and are already predicting great luck 
for the season of 1914. Their hopes, so far, have 
not been borne out by the facts. Dozens of dis¬ 
ciples of the gentle art of fishing were abroad 
early Saturday morning, and all that day, and all 
day Monday, and Tuesday—and so on, ad libitum, 
they whipped and will continue to whip the Cat- 
skill streams. But they did not come home 
ladened with spoils; nor will they for some days 
to come, according to those ancients among them 
who refuse to be deceived by present conditions. 
It will be a week or ten days before the trout in 
the Catskills begin to run freely and take bait 
readily. Little flyfishing is being indulged, the 
fishermen preferring to chance to the good old 
angle worm, or such grubs as can be obtained, and 
which the trout like to eat. 
One single ray of sunshine illumines the other¬ 
wise dull and unimportant trout opening: On 
Monday, the 6th, that famous trouter, Henry 
Wessell, of Catskill village, aided and abetted by 
those other noted fishermen, Conrad J. Hammer 
and Roscoe Saxe, took from the muddy waters 
of the Potic Creek, a speckled beauty weighing 
three pounds and three ounces. S. D. NIVER. 
FIRST MAINE SALMON FOR 1914. 
Bangor, Me., April 6, 1914. 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
Off again, on again, Flannegan! might well be 
repeated in the catching of the first salmon at 
the Bangor salmon pool this year, for it com¬ 
pletes the tale of the catch. 
Michael Flannegan, a local angler who never 
before had the privilege of taking the first fish, 
was the fortunate angler, and when one regards 
the conditions, the wonder is that he caught any 
fish at all. As it was, he had the narrowest of 
escapes from dire disaster. 
Mr. Flannegan went early to the pool on the 
very first day of open season with his boat and, 
FOREST AND STREAM 
entering it alone, rowed about over the ice girt 
pool, which except for the side toward the big 
dam of the Bangor water works, was entirely 
surrounded by big cakes of ice which left an 
open pool from shore to shore, with a depth below 
the sluice end of a bare 300 feet. With the full 
power of the Penobscot river sweeping over the 
dam and under the ice field that stretches to open 
water miles below, the conditions were far from 
favorable. 
As Mr. Flannegan rowed his boat about over 
the pool a fish rose blithely to the lure, the rod 
at the instant lying in the bottom of the boat. 
The vicious twitch which this king of game fish 
gave the line snapped , the slender tip about three 
inches from the end and the fish was gone. Then 
Mr. Flannegan went ashore, secured some twigs 
and spliced the break, so that the line would play 
freely through the rings. He persuaded Charles 
E. Bissell, a well-known pool angler, to take the 
oars and together they ventured on to the pool 
again, changing the fly to a silver doctor. It was 
not long before the salmon, or another, rose 
gamely to the tempter, the angler struck and the 
fight was on. 
Owing to the icy approaches to the pool, it was 
impossible to make the usual landing. Mr. Flan¬ 
negan took position on a ledge of rock which at 
that time of the tide jutted out from the water 
and there made his last stand, playing the fish to a 
finish and finally gaffing it in safety. 
The prize weighed eighteen pounds and was 
sent by a number of President Wilson’s admirers 
to the White House, to grace the Presidential 
table. One other fish has since been taken, but 
conditions are not yet good for any promising 
sport at the pool. The ice is steadily rotting and 
by another week the river will, it is believed, be 
clear from the Bangor dam to the sea. 
H. W. R. 
$750 REWARD. 
All the world of decent men and women was 
shocked by the report of the murder, on Sunday, 
April s, at Rome, New York, of a State Game 
Protector, who lost his life in pursuit of his duty. 
This man, whose courage was equal to his sense 
of duty, was Samuel W. Taylor; and the moment 
the tragedy became known to the National Asso¬ 
ciation of Audubon Societies, its executive officer 
offered a reward of $250 for the apprehension 
and conviction of the murderer. This offer was 
telegraphed to all the larger newspapers of cen¬ 
tral New York, so that no time might be lost; 
and it was immediately followed by an additional 
reward of $500 offered by the members of the 
Conservation Commission of the State of New 
York. 
The homicide occurred when Mr. Taylor dis¬ 
covered two men, appearing to be Italians, roam¬ 
ing in the fields near Rome and shooting robins. 
Mr. Taylor went toward them to make an arrest 
for their double violation of State laws, and when 
within arm’s length was shot and instantly killed. 
T. Gilbert Pearson, secretary of the National 
Association of Audubon Societies, says that the 
fact that the man who lost his life was not a 
warden of the Association, or even known to him, 
makes no difference in his eyes. It is his pur¬ 
pose, and the purpose and one of the recognized 
functions of the Association, to do all that is pos¬ 
sible to be done to put a stop to illegal gunning, 
or any other form of violation of the laws for the 
protection of game-birds and song-birds in any 
part of the country; and the present example of 
activity is directly in the line of that public ser¬ 
vice the Association is trying to perform. 
CONDITIONS ALONG THE NEVERSINK. 
Sullivan County, N. Y., April 6, 1914. 
Editor Forest and Stream : 
Was out to-day along the stream. Didn’t go 
fishing; just took my new rod along to try it out. 
It worked fine. Did not get a strike and was not 
disappointed, as I did not think trout would rise 
to a fly in the present condition of the Neversink. 
The stream is very high—about three times the 
water there should be to fish it good. 
Snow water will be running up to the first of 
May. From 12 to 24 inches of snow in the woods 
around here yet; there must be three or four feet 
of snow in the woods at the head of the Never¬ 
sink. The fields around here are getting bare of 
snow now. 
Ice all thawed out of stream gradually. There 
were no ice jams at all this spring; once in a 
while a piece of ice would float down. The ground 
is frozen hard as a rock, and it ought to be a good 
maple sugar sap day to-morrow. 
Not a fly on the stream yet this year, but I think 
by May 5 they will be coming out and the trout 
with them. 
There ought to be fine fishing this spring. The 
ice went out in such good shape there should be 
good hatches of flies. I have a fly to catch that 
eight-pound brook trout in - Lake. It was 
made specially for that big one we saw jumping 
last August when we didn’t have a fly rod with us. 
H. B. C. 
PROTECT THE POUT. 
March 10, 1914. 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
Our piazza extends out several feet over the 
water twenty-six feet below. In the spring when 
the perch are working in shore, I catch all we 
want, directly from the piazza. We go in April 
and come away in November. When the ice goes 
out, and for a few days after, we get good catches 
of pike, and then they go to deeper water. Pick¬ 
erel and pout fishing are fine. I hardly think the 
pout fishing can be outdone anywhere. September 
and October to the first of November is the time 
for this. From dark to 9 o’clock twenty to twenty- 
five is about the usual catch, and seventy-five not 
very unusual. I get from one to three hundred 
in the daytime at the mouth of the rivers, during 
a freshet. 
Pouts are not protected, but they ought to be, 
I think. They are one of the best food fish we 
have. They are inoffensive fellows, do but little 
harm, multiply fast and are good to eat. Many 
persons think they are the best we have. For me, 
first a perch, then pike, and next pout. We have 
plenty of pickerel, but you have to troll to get 
them. The trolling ground is around or near 
weeds, and I cannot see well enough to follow 
them. I do quite a bit of trolling, as I can see 
and feel enough to manipulate the power, but 
some one must take the wheel. The protection 
which pout need more than anything else is to 
keep hoodlums from spearing them while in their 
spawning holes. I have known men to get as 
many as they could carry in an hour’s time, in 
that way. There is a law against using a spear, 
but when pout are in their holes spawning, you 
can almost put your hand on them. J. E. E. 
