Forest and Stream 
$3 a Year, 10 Cts. a Copy, 
Six Months, $1.50. 
NEW YORK, SATURDAY, APRIL 20, 1912. 
VOL. LXXVIIL—No. 16. 
127 Franklin St., New York. 
California Fishing 
N a letter last fall I stated that I would tell 
of California fauna, etc., as noted in my 
travels, during the inclement weather of 
winter. My. excuse for not having “made good’’ 
is that there has practically been 
no such weather this winter in 
Northeastern California. Pioneers 
say that it has been the coldest 
and driest winter of the past fifty 
years. There was a week of snow 
and rain last Christmas and New 
Years, but it cleared up, and Jupi¬ 
ter neglected to put the sprink¬ 
ling cart into action until March 
I, and the precipitation for a 
week was so niggardly that a 
serious drouth faces the Sierra 
Nevada region. The Sierra Buttes 
and other high eminences are 
snow-clad, as usual, but the nive¬ 
ous mantle is thin, and summery 
April weather prevails. As a re¬ 
sult, fishing will be good right 
from the start, when the season 
opens for the upper Yuba and 
Feather River districts, the rea¬ 
son assigned being that with the 
water low and the days hot, the 
trout will begin biting earlier. In 
many seasons good trout fishing 
was not reported until in June, 
following winters when the snow 
was plentiful and the melting 
slow, the rivers continuing high 
and the water cold. Under the 
latter conditions the trout would 
be very backward in rising to 
either bait or fly. But the ang¬ 
lers are jubilant, are overhauling 
rods and tackle, and an early mi¬ 
gration will be inaugurated to¬ 
ward the favorite fishing grounds 
in Plumas, Sierra and Nevada 
counties. 
Excellent sport is promised in 
the high altitude lakes of the two 
last named counties. As they are 
remote from the railroads, it 
means that the fisherman must 
make a long trip with team or pack and riding 
animals, carrying camp equipment, but the Cali¬ 
fornia patrons of the art piscatorial do not, as a 
rule, mind the expense of either time or money 
that such expeditions most generally involve, and 
there are those who have to travel as much as 
100 miles from their homes to their favorite ang- 
By WILLIAM FITZMUGGINS 
ling spot in the high sierras. It is not always neces¬ 
sary, however, to go fully outfitted for camping 
in the high lake regions, for at some of the lakes, 
which are utilized as reservoirs, the caretakers 
of the latter often have accommodations for 
the entertainment of fishermen who do not 
care to go to the trouble or expense of a camp¬ 
ing outfit. Good board and lodging is to be 
had at reasonable rates at such resorts, or at 
stage stations not far distant. Sometimes a 
ranchman or hermit miner will take a “boarder,” 
but the best rule to follow is to carry your own 
blankets and a light set of cooking utensils 
and make your own camp, which generally, in 
the region described, can be pitched where 
timber is plentiful for a lean-to 
and fuel. 
There are a large number of 
lakes in the eastern portion of 
the counties named, in chains, 
which would form a route for 
an extended fishing trip, that for 
interest, awards and length, can 
hardly be duplicated anywhere 
else in the United States, unless 
in Minnesota or Michigan. With 
a horse to ride, and another to 
pack the camp outfit and fishing 
and hunting paraphernalia, the 
recreation seeker could start, say 
at Emigrant Gap on the South¬ 
ern Pacific railway and move 
leisurely northward, making a 
new camp each night at new fish¬ 
ing grounds, crossing Nevada 
and Sierra counties, and going 
into Plumas county to Quincy on 
the Western Pacific railway. Or, 
reverse the order of the itinerary. 
It is a good bear and deer coun¬ 
try, but small game is scarce un¬ 
less woodchucks and porcupines 
are counted as such. Many sheep 
are grazed along the chain of 
lakes in the summer, and fresh 
mutton is generally obtainable 
when one tires of trout and the 
deer and bear persist in keeping 
out of sight. 
North Bloomfield, where I now 
am, is situated sixteen miles 
northeast of Nevada City and is 
the remnant of a once very pros¬ 
perous hydraulic mining camp, 
the aggregate produce of the 
gravels in the deposit in the 
ancient channels for the four 
miles here, according" to the rec¬ 
ords, being all of $20,000,000 in 
gold dust. But since the inhibi¬ 
tion of that form of mining the giant monitors 
have been silent, the reservoirs have become the 
breeding place of a small-sized loud-mouthed 
frog, while the pits of the “diggins” have turned 
into ponds where a “bull-cat” thrives. These seem 
to be abundant and at a length of seven inches 
are highly esteemed as a food and form a pre- 
A ROCKY CORNER. 
Photograph by Norman E. Spaulding. 
