26 o 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Feb. 13, 1909. 
a different matter to plow knee deep up a tor¬ 
rent like the Esopus. I once watched a friend 
wallow his way some two hundred yards against 
the beating of a typical rift, and I remember 
how sincerely he remarked when he had reached 
the top “that lugs.” 
It is argued that as the fish lie with their 
heads up stream watching for food, they are 
not so easily frightened by an angler approach¬ 
ing from below. On this proposition it seems 
as if the evidence was not entirely one-sided. 
Their eyes are so located that they can see 
nearly as well backward as forward. A trout, 
with his eyes set for forward vision, as ours 
are, would be a curious looking fish. Then, too, 
their enemies mostly approach from the rear 
and against these they must be constantly on 
guard. We have all seen schools of redfins that 
had their tailless members, and if we took the 
hint we began looking for a big trout in that 
locality. The missing members of those little 
fish are quite suggestive of the direction of the 
attack. 
On the other hand, the question of obstacles 
in the trout’s line of vision divides itself about 
equally between the two directions of approach. 
Many of the brown trout and some of the rain¬ 
bows lie above the rocks, but at least the natives 
and a part of the rainbows are below. It all 
seems to amount to about this: to fish up stream 
is orthodox, to fish down stream is easy. 
While the subject of how enemies attack trout 
is fresh in mind, it should be suggested that if 
every fisherman would put himself out of the 
way to kill all the water-snakes he finds, he 
would rid the community of some very illegal 
anglers. When one has seen a water-snake grab 
a trout by the tail, and then hang as limp as a 
wet rag, while the fish dashes around the pool 
until he races himself to death, he will remem¬ 
ber the spectacle for a long time. Perhaps it 
will be urged that to kill all the water-snakes 
would be to upset the balance in nature and 
allow the trout to become dangerously abundant. 
If this is the case and someone will kill the 
snakes, I will pledge the “Camp Don’t Hurry” 
crowd to do their share toward keeping the 
trout in subjection. 
I do not know whether it is a streak of super¬ 
stition that seems to be in all anglers, or whether 
there is a real atmospheric cause for it; at any 
rate many apparently good fishing days are not 
fishing days at all, and I might add vice versa. 
There are days when the sky, the air and the 
water all seem right, and yet you have no faith 
in catching anything. The line will not go out 
with any zest. It seems lazy and limpsy and 
almost never reaches just the right spot. Sort 
your flies as best you may on such a day and 
they look like perfect little humbugs to you. 
What is still more important, they appear to 
look like humbugs to the trout. It seems at 
such times as if you fairly had to fight for every 
rise you get, and then it will not be a genuine 
strike. It is more likely to be an indifferent 
flirt of the tail. 
A gentleman writing from Philadelphia with¬ 
in the past year suggested barometric conditions 
as possibly accounting for this sort of general 
indifference. Last season, while we did not have 
a barometer with us, we watched the readings 
in the New York papers to some extent, and 
we are inclined to think there is something in 
this writer’s remarks. The high pressure appar¬ 
ently gave better fishing results. But again, 
there are other days when the wind and sun¬ 
shine are against the generally accepted ideas 
of trout fishing suitability, but somehow we have 
good luck for all that. The line is as keen as 
a steel spring. Our flies at thirty or forty feet 
appear by some miracle to have become en¬ 
dowed with life. They float among the living 
so naturally that we look a second time to 
separate them. It seems as if by telepathy they 
know the spot we are looking at and fly to it 
like tiny birds. The fact that they look natural 
to us is very good proof that they look natural 
to the fish. But a better proof is that after 
perhaps days of lassitude we find the trout sud¬ 
denly on the rise. 
Robert Bruce, has frequently told me of a 
peculiar experience he has had in a number 
of instances on “off days.” This will not often 
work, but occasionally when there seems no 
possibility of catching trout a few can be raised 
by whipping the fly down on to the water vigor¬ 
ously and drawing it swiftly across the stream. 
This is so entirely contrary to all good fishing 
practice that at most times it would be fatal 
to success. However, on the only days when 
it will work, there is little danger of scaring 
away any natural rises. We have never been 
able to figure out a very satisfactory explana¬ 
tion unless this is one. There may be at cer¬ 
tain times some larva which hatches under 
water and goes directly to shore, something 
after the manner of the dobson. If this is true, 
it is possible that the trout feed upon them, and 
are looking for objects moving in that direction. 
I believe it has now, after some centuries of 
discussion, come to be a generally acknowledged 
truth that “you can’t eat your cake and have 
it, too.” This applies to certain points in trout 
fishing very forcibly. When I saw ahead of 
me a particularly fine looking spot for a fish 
to lie, my thrifty training used to prompt me 
to try all the inferior places in the immediate 
neighborhood first, leaving this sweetest morsel 
to the last. The result was that I generally 
caught my fly in a snag or made some other 
blunder which effectually spoiled the chances in 
the perfect spot before I had an opportunity to 
test it. Years of discretion and some ridicule 
from Robert Bruce brought a reform, so that 
now I believe in making the first cast where 
the fly will float over the surest water. There 
will be plenty of time to try the poorer ground 
after the one vital question has been settled. 
Perhaps it is scarcely fair to tell of so many 
places to fish without telling of some phases of 
water that it is better not to waste time upon. 
Many young anglers seem to have a feeling that 
a trout stream is a trout stream and wonder why 
they catch nothing when they follow along the 
shore of a large creek and cast their flies in 
the most convenient places. It is almost axio¬ 
matic that convenience and good trout fishing 
do not go hand in hand. The successful angler 
must plan and wiggle and wade. When one 
sees a section of the stream where there is a 
light colored, gravelly bottom sloping gently 
from the shore and no boulders or hiding places 
can be detected, he may as well pass on. If 
he were a minnow and the time were night, he 
might get more bites than he wanted, but dur¬ 
ing daylight such water has very few trout in 
it. Sometimes the stream will spread out to 
a great width and flow rapidly over a pebbly 
bottom before it breaks into a rift. This water 
is nice to wade in, but unless you can find a 
dark looking pocket in it, you had better use 
the time to rest your arm. Many streams have 
good looking pools that have drifts of sand and 
sodden sawdust in the bottom—no trout there. 
Generally speaking, in any place where you 
could see a fish for some distance if he came 
to your fly, you might as well keep your fly 
in your pocket. 
Of course at night trout roam through all 
the barren spots, but it is only by accident that 
an angler stands a chance of raising one with 
a fly. They are hunting for minnows then, and 
if you chance to be on the stream late in a 
moonlight evening you will see and hear some 
curious things. I remember being with a friend 
at a broad pool on the Esopus one June even¬ 
ing. It was so dark we could scarcely see our 
flies and we were wading well out in the stream 
in order to fish a channel. Three or four 
boulders, perhaps as large as bushel baskets, 
were grouped in the thin edge of the water just 
at the shore line. My friend called attention 
to a commotion which was going on around the 
foot of these boulders. The water there could 
not have been more than six inches deep, but a 
monstrous trout had sailed into it, and so far 
as appearances and splashing went, he was hav¬ 
ing a regular rough and tumble with the min¬ 
nows. His quick movements threw spray all 
over the stones and made a noise like tossing 
a handful of pebbles into the stream. 
We quit the channel at once and began cast¬ 
ing for him, but he had no appetite for flies. 
We tried everything from a black gnat to a 
white miller, but without results. Sometimes we 
drew squarely over what, in the darkness, looked 
to be his exposed back, but he paid not the 
slightest attention to us or our fishing. With 
occasional periods of rest, he kept up the fight 
with the minnows for as much as twenty 
minutes. Finally I decided to see just how near 
I could get to him, and by moving slowly I 
walked within five feet before he flopped around 
and sailed off, spreading a great wake in the 
moonlight. Winfield T. Sherwood. 
Mr. Croker as an Angler. 
Palm Beach, Fla., Jan. 29. — Editor Forest and 
Stream: Richard Croker, who has taken a cot¬ 
tage here for the season, is the center of attrac¬ 
tion. After a few rounds of golf he makes for 
the ocean pier, where Captain Harry Winter, 
his attendant, has his rod and reel ready. He 
immediately takes off his coat, puts on his surf 
belt and goes at it, always after big fish. He 
has made several good catches so far. The 
photograph I send you shows him playing a 
twelve-foot shark which gave him a good tussle 
and took over an hour to land. Alfred Hayman 
and Andrew Freedman, of New York, who arc 
Mr. Croker’s guests, assisted in hauling the shark 
on to the pier. F. A. Metcalf, who happened 
along, took the picture just before the fish was 
brought to gaff. 
The fishing on the ocean pier here is better 
this year than it has ever been. Rods, bait and 
guides can be hired on the pier at reasonable 
rates. William Dietsch. 
All the fish laws of the United States and 
Canada, revised to date and now in force, are 
given in the Game Laws in Brief. See adv. 
