Nov. 2, 1912 
FOREST AND STREAM 
565 
CALIFORNIA FISHING. 
Continued from page 563. 
the piers almost every day. At times there are 
three or four hundred people fishing from the 
Santa Monica pier at the same time. The Santa 
Monica pier is built of cement and steel, and is 
used only as a pleasure pier. There are metal 
rails about four feet high along the edge of the 
pier and good seats, so that the fishermen can 
sit down and enjoy themselves while waiting for 
a strike. The pier is kept nice and clean, and 
has two bait houses, where one can buy or rent a 
full outfit for fishing. 
The Santa Monica pier runs out 2,000 feet 
into the ocean and is thirty feet wide. I enjoy 
fishing for jack smelts more than any other fish 
where there is a good run of the silver fish. The 
jack smelts we catch are from ten to twenty 
inches in length and although they do not put 
up the fight of a pound or two-pound mackerel 
or many of the larger kinds of fish, yet it is 
very pleasant to have a sixteen-inch jack send in 
that he is on one of the hooks at the end of 
a 150-foot line all ready to be reeled in. We have 
about twelve No. 6 hooks on our lines and cast 
out from the pier from 125 to 200 feet. Some¬ 
times we reel in three or four at the same time. 
Then we have business on hand. I have 300 feet 
of fine line on my reel. The line is warranted 
to stand a twenty-five-pound pull. When a large 
fish like the sea trout or yellowfin takes hold, the 
extra line is needed. 
A short time ago I was catching pompano. 
While reeling a small pompano in, a sea trout 
took hold of the fish. I hooked the trout and 
then had to play him quite a long time before 
bringing him up to the pier. I landed the trout 
and found that I had a fish weighing six pounds. 
Three weeks ago I went to the Los Angeles 
pier with a friend from Iowa. In one morning 
we landed eighty-five mackerel. Only two hooks 
are needed for mackerel there if there is a good 
run. The sportsman will have enough to do, as 
they fight well. The Los Angeles pier runs into 
the ocean 5,200 feet where the water is fifty feet 
deep. It is a fine pier for yellowtail, bass and 
the larger fish. At times sharks are very plentiful 
and the larger ones car.ry off many good hooks 
and lines. When a large shark takes hold, no 
small line will stop him. He goes out to sea. 
It is about time for the pompanos to come 
in. They are a very beautiful fish and are con¬ 
sidered about the best table fish on the west 
coast. 
The climate of Santa Monica is such that 
one can fish every day, winter and summer. 
The winters and summers are much alike. 
In winter there is not frost enough to kill a 
tomato plant. I have seen them grow through 
two winters. Once last summer I saw the mer¬ 
cury at 87 degrees for a short time. Almost any 
day it runs up to about 75 degrees. There is 
hardly rain enough to interfere with fishing. Less 
than twelve inches fell in 1911. 
The duck shooting season is now open and 
every morning I hear the guns on the flats below 
Venice. I think the shooting is good. Shall try 
it before long. The ducks are hardly as good 
for table use as the ducks of Iowa. 
John G. Smith. 
Forest and Stream’s audience is growing 
for the simple reason that the magazine is getting 
better all the time. 
The Cogitative Bass Crank. 
BY JOSEPH CAWTHORN. 
I’ve been thinking, sadly thinking', 
As these autumn evenings pass, 
Of my time and money wasted 
In pursuing striped bass. 
For the cash that I have spent on bait 
And tackle, I’ll be bound, 
I could buy a whole fish market 
And put in a private pound. 
Shedder crabs and bloodworms 
I’ve purchased by the ton; 
I’ve stood for hours on the beach, 
Been parboiled by the sun. 
I’ve tramped the sands in rubber boots 
Till I was nearly dead, 
Digging big holes in the ocean 
With a four-ounce chunk of lead. 
I’ve fouled and “busted” rod and reel, 
And cast along the shore, 
Of leaders, swivels, hooks and leads, 
A million, maybe more. 
JOSEPH CAWTHORN. 
Although this gentleman is one of America’s leading 
actors, he also is an authority on surf-fishing. He holds 
the channel bass record for the New Jersey coast with 
a 94-pounder. 
I’ve neglected friends and relatives. 
My business, home and wife, 
I’ve bought tackle till John Seger 
Has a mortgage on my life. 
And what have I to show 
For all this waste of energy. 
After flirting all last summer 
With this measly, stingy sea? 
Toadfish, skates and robins. 
(I can always yank them in). 
Dog sharks by the thousand, 
But of the stripers, not a fin. 
At night I dream of zebras. 
And convicts of all types, 
American flags and barber poles— 
Everything with stripes. 
I dream I’m fishing for them all—- 
T’m a Jonah, sure, it seems—- 
It’s pretty tough, for I can’t even 
Catch them in my dreams. 
And then I sit and listen 
For hours at a stretch, 
While the old-time anglers ’round here 
Tell of fish they used to catch. 
One begins and tells you 
How he started out at noon, 
And by six o’clock had eighty-seven 
Stripers on the flume. 
Another says, “That’s nothing, 
When the wind was in the south, 
I could always drop a bloodworm 
In a sixty-pounder’s mouth.” 
I listen and say nothing— 
After all, they’re not to blame, 
When I’ve fished as long as they have 
I suppose I’ll lie the same. 
The bass ran fine last summer, 
No one stopped them, you can bet, 
And from Seger’s list I reckon 
That they’re running somewhere yet. 
It’s really quite pathetic 
How we fishermen hope on 
For a year of real good fishing 
Like we had in seasons gone. 
I have sworn by all the gods, 
That I will never fish again; 
But if I’m alive next summer, 
It’s a good bet, just the same, 
You’ll find me somewhere on the beach, 
And perhaps you’ll hear me swear, 
As I stand and fish for hours 
For the bass that isn’t there. 
And when my time has come 
To shuffle off this mortal coil, 
And leave behind my fishing days 
And other care and toil, 
When I cross the River Jordan, 
If it’s rough or smooth as glass. 
I’ll be sitting in the stern sheets 
Trolling for a bass. 
THE TOP RAIL. 
An Indiana game warden being at a loss to 
account for the suddenly increasing number of 
fish offered in the markets of his locality made 
an investigation, thinking to discover the illegal 
use of nets, but in this particular he was dis¬ 
appointed. He did, however, discover the cause 
of the activity in the fish market. He noticed 
two men, one of whom had taken up a position 
on a bridge used by a trolley company, and the 
other was in a boat just below. At frequent in¬ 
tervals the man on the bridge was observed to 
strike the trolley wire with his fishpole, and im¬ 
mediately after the other would gather up quan¬ 
tities of fish. They were fishing by electricity, 
and at each strike a charge of electricity passed 
through a wire from the pole into the water and 
killed the fish in the vicinity. 
* 4 = * 
While Seth Eaton, a rural mail carrier, was 
driving over his trip on Plymouth street, Middle- 
boro, Mass., a few days ago, his horse stopped 
and Seth saw a flock of fifteen quail dusting 
themselves in the soft sand on the road ahead. 
He would have run over them had the horse 
not shield and stopped. Also on Thompson street 
there have been seen many flocks of this little 
bird, some of them numbering eighteen and 
twenty. Grizzly King. 
