470 
FOREST AND STREAM 
April 13, 1912 
If an angler had the time to travel about and 
look into conditions on many waters, I have 
no doubt that he would find many streams that 
are peculiarly suited to the use of the dry-fly 
and would enjoy first-rate sport. 
A good angler tells me that there is good 
dry-fly fishing and great abundance of insect 
life on streams in Wisconsin. 
The new game and fish law is now in the 
hands of the Governor, awaiting his signa¬ 
ture. There seems to be no doubt that he will 
sign it, and that its provisions will go into effect 
immediately. The opening of the trout season 
will be fixed for May i instead of April 16, as 
heretofore. The limit as to size of trout to be 
basketed remains at six inches. An effort was 
made to have all fish under seven inches re¬ 
turned. A six-inch trout is very small, while 
an eleven-inch small-mouth black bass is quite 
a fish. When fishing with flies and trout tackle 
an eleven-inch bass looks pretty good to you 
when the sport happens to be poor. 
I am afraid there will be disappointment for 
many in the postponement of the opening day 
of trout fishing. It is not that the fishing is 
very good in April on our mountain streams, for 
the water is usually high and the weather cold 
and often disagreeable, but after .the long winter 
men are crazy to get out into the country to be 
in the stream with a fly-rod in hand. The fresh, 
keen air is so invigorating that almost any sort 
of grub seems to go to the right spot. I have 
seen men who had no appetite in the city devour 
great piles of buckwheat cakes that were just 
a wee bit sour and cover them with floods of 
maple syrup. Each cake was about the size of 
a dinner plate—good substantial stuff that would 
stay the pangs of hunger for several hours. 
The weather frames well, sun and rain alter¬ 
nating to remove all traces of frost and snow 
and start things growing. Theodore Gordon. 
Coloring Fishes. 
Flowers can be artificially colored, we know, 
with more or less success, by chemical agency. 
Animals generally escape counterfeiting, with few 
exceptions, although some living things undergo 
a process of metempsychosis. For instance, it 
has not been unknown for the cat to become a 
hare, or a dab a sole, or the horse a bullock 
when in the meat market. La Fontaine has given 
us the ass in the lion’s skin and the jay with 
peacock’s plumage, but these deceived no one— 
they betrayed themselves. The latest in counter¬ 
feiting is the carp. In Sicily it is said that by 
introducing into the water chalk, iron and little 
peat, colors will be imparted to the carp. After 
treatment in a bath of these concomitants for 
a fortnight, the fish is given another chemically 
prepared bath into which is introduced iron and 
tan. By increasing or diminishing the quantities 
the color can be either accentuated or diminished. 
The process is somewhat hazardous, but we learn 
from a Paris contemporary that in the end an 
apparently new species of ornamental fish is pro¬ 
duced which commands a high price.—London 
Globe. 
All the fish laws of the United States and 
Canada, revised to date and noiv in force, are 
given in the Game Laws in Brief. See adv. 
Large Kingfish. 
Red Bank, N. J., April ^.—Editor Forest and 
Stream: 1 am inclosing herewith a photograph 
of a very large kingfish weighing 32 pounds, 
54 inches long. 22inches girth, caught by INIrs. 
William G. Selby, of Marietta, Ohio, at Sara¬ 
sota, Fla. 
Mr. Selby writes me that the fishing has been 
disappointing this spring on account of the num¬ 
ber of southwest gales along the Gulf coast of 
Florida. 
The conditions were the same while I was 
MRS. SELBY AND HER KINGFISH. 
there during January and February, there being 
a great amount of rain and high southwest winds, 
most unusual for that part of the State in win¬ 
ter. Only scattering channel bass and trout be¬ 
tween storms. T. H. Grant. 
Trout in North Carolina. 
Linville Falls, N. C., April 3.— Editor Forest 
and Stream: The fishing season on Linville 
River will open as usual on the first day of 
May. The prospect this year is the best that it 
has been during the four years I have been here. 
The stream has been well stocked, sometimes 
twice a year. During the past two seasons it 
has been well protected, a warden employed to 
patrol the river and prevent illegal fishing. 
Local fishing has been restricted to one per¬ 
son from a family once a week. The rights of 
the visiting angler have thus been cared for. 
The river has not suffered a bad flood for three 
years, so the fish have not suffered from the 
effects of washing and debris. The limit here 
is twenty-five fish per day, and none smaller 
than eight inches—rainbow trout. This spring 
two new boarding houses will open. Incidentally 
the rhododendrons give promise of the greatest 
bloom ever seen here, as they are all bristling 
with buds. The bloom begins about May i and 
lasts, with the kalmia and various azaleas, through 
July. F. W. Bicknell. 
Conservation. 
Buffalo, N. Y., April g.-—Editor Forest and 
Stream: That little paragraph on the editorial 
page of your last issue, about the Legislature 
and its bills, did me real good, particularly the 
reference to the Governor’s “conservation, or 
is it conversation policy.” The newspaper men 
down there at the Capitol, who see things from 
the inside, call it the “Con” commission and 
sang a song about it at their annual dinner, 
which I was so fortunate as to be able to attend. 
An3'body who has read the commission’s numer¬ 
ous bulletins or watched its struggles for legis¬ 
lation will appreciate the delicious humor of the 
rhymes. I Send it for the edification of your 
readers and the good of the cause. 
ODE TO CONSERV.ATION. 
(Spell it “Owed”) 
.Air: “Solomon Levi.” 
Vt'e are the Con Commission, and we’d have you under¬ 
stand 
Yoii cannot get good water power ’less we condemn the 
land; 
We’ll save the fish and game for you, if we may make 
the law, 
The Legi.slature’s out of date—the worst we ever saw. 
Chorus. 
O Conservation, what a lovely word, 
Hope of the Nation, nobody can afford 
To doubt the things we say we’ll do if we can have our 
way 
With woods and waters, dams and things, and cash 
enough to pay. 
Whoop up reforestation, for the mills all need the trees. 
And pulpwood north is mighty scarce, each lumberman 
now sees; 
Hurrah for w'ater storage, boys, and push our bills along. 
Give us the power to hand you things, and listen to 
our song— 
Chorus. 
We are the Con Commission, and we’ve given you the cue. 
To push our little bills along is all we ask of you; 
Don’t seek for explanations, you can get those later on. 
Just put the whole thing up to Us, Commissioners of 
Con. 
Chorus. 
C. R. P. 
High Water. 
Bloomington, Ill., April 6.— Editor Forest and 
Stream: Fishing is unusually disappointing this 
spring, due to high water and ice in the rivers 
and creeks. The ice has remained in the streams 
much later than usual and fish are not biting 
well. 
There is mourning in the ranks of Illinois 
fishermen over the destruction of- the picturesque 
dam in the Kankakee River above Wilmington. 
This dam went out with an ice gorge recently. 
The vicinity of the dam was always marked by 
the best fishing on the river, and was the haunt 
of thousands of anglers during the past thirty 
years. 
The ever increasing number of garfish in' the 
Kankakee River has decided the fishing organi¬ 
zations along that stream to plan a war of ex¬ 
termination during the coming season. 
E. E. Pierson. 
