FOREST AND STREAM 
Where Fly-fishing for the “Speckled Beauty” 
The Kennebago Certainly Possesses Charm for Those Who Love 
411 
Reigns Supreme 
e Big Out-Doors 
By Chas. Zibeon Southard 
A Quick Lunch for Six on Upper Kennebago Stream. 
OME two thousand feet above 
sea level, away up among the 
mountains of the northwestern 
portion of Maine in Frarjklin 
county, and distant from the 
Canadian line some twelve miles 
as the crow flies, are two of the 
most beautiful lakes of North 
America. They are known as “Big” and “Little” 
Kennebago and they are flawless gems of the 
finest quality; yet they differ from each other 
by virtue of their unique settings. Unlike so 
many lakes of Maine and other timber States 
these charming sheets of watef have no dead 
timber nor any other unsightly features to mar 
their surrounding beauty. While a large part 
of the section in which these lakes are situated 
has been “lumbered” in the past, it was done in 
such a way that the natural beauties of the for¬ 
ests are to-day unimpaired. In some places 
where “old lumber camps” are still to be found 
the picturesque beauties have been enhanced and 
one’s interest is more keenly aroused on that 
account. It is at such places that the nature 
lover, with his camera at hand, is in his ele¬ 
ment; here his life is full of real pleasure while 
taking pictures which will, in the future, enable 
him to live over again the joys of the past. 
Up to three years ago Kennebago Section could 
only be reached by buckboard from Rangeley 
and it was a ten-mile ride. Over some six miles 
of its length—it seemed to the uninitiated about 
twenty—and, on account of its roughness, to 
double discount the old historic “rocky road 
to Dublin.” 
Only four species of fish in all are found in 
the waters of this section, which is a most re¬ 
markable and interesting fact; They are the 
Brook Trout, Salve,inus-fontinalis, the land¬ 
locked, Salmon, Salma-salar sebago, the Smelt, 
Osmerus mordax, and the minnow, Cyprinidae; 
the two latter varieties furnishing the food for 
the two former. 
The waters of Kennebago Section furnish, be¬ 
yond peradventure, one of the most, if not the 
most, remarkable natural breeding and propagat¬ 
ing areas for the Brook Trout found anywhere in 
America. 
Land-locked salmon are caught in both lakes 
and in the “Big” lake occasionally as large as 
six pounds, but they do not seem to breed well 
in these waters notwithstanding the fact that 
both lakes are abundantly supplied with smelt, 
which are their best and favorite food. 
If I am mistaken and the salmon really do 
breed well, I then account for their scarcity, 
judging from the few that are seen and caught 
year after year, in this way: that the young and 
small salmon in the spring work out of the lakes 
into the stream and go down the stream and 
over the Falls. Once in the water of the lower 
section of Kennebago Stream, which is below 
Kennebago Falls, they never can return to the 
waters from which they came because the Falls 
offer an effectual barrier. 
The fishing season opens in the spring just as 
soon as the ice goes out of the lakes, which time 
varies with the seasons from the fifteenth to the 
twenty-fifth of May, and continues to the first of 
October. 
It is here that the angler can, among surround¬ 
ings which are intensely interesting, instructive, 
ever-changing and beautiful, enjoy fly-fishing to 
his heart’s content, knowing to a certainty that 
when he has a rise or strike it is from “the most 
beautiful fish that swim' - ,” the balvelinus-fonti- 
nalis. or from the salmon, the “Silver King” of 
game fishes. 
These waters are restricted solely to fly-fishing 
with the artificial fly and during the entire open 
season trout can be caught; but the best fish¬ 
ing is to be had, and the largest fish will rise 
and strike, in June and September, although some 
fine fishing days come along in July and August, 
when specimens are taken which weigh from 
two to three pounds. 
Right here I wish to say that when I speak of 
catching trout I do not mean that they are 
killed, because most of the anglers who fish 
these lakes and streams seldom kill a trout un¬ 
less for food or for some scientific purpose. 
Trout caught and landed are carefully taken off 
the hook by the angler or his guide and imme¬ 
diately returned to the wat r unhurt. 
I have discovered it to be a fact, after many 
years of investigation, that not over one trout 
in one hundred ever dies, or becomes diseased, 
or is attacked by parasites when handled in this 
way and returned at once to the water. The re¬ 
turning of trout to the water after they have 
been caught has become, in this section, almost 
“an unwritten law,” and this is one of the prin¬ 
cipal reasons why fly-fishing in these waters im¬ 
proves and remains above par, season after 
season. 
The laws governing the fishing in Kennebago 
Section are wise ones, aid as I have said, it is 
restricted solely to fly-fishing with the artificial 
fly. 
Big Kennebago Lake is five miles long and its 
extreme width is about one mile; the southerly 
end is called the “head” of the lake, and the 
northerly end the “foot.” This, however, is 
really a misnomer because the “inlet” and “out¬ 
let” to the lake are both et the same place, 
namely, the northerly end. The water flows into 
the lake from Kennebago Stre m when the lake 
is low and into Kennebago St"ram from the lake 
when the lake is high. The lake is also supplied 
by many springs and from (Blanchard’s Brook, 
Flatiron Brook and Wilb r Brook, all of which 
are near its southerly end; and from the Big 
Inlet and Norton’s Brook, which are at the 
northerly end. 
This beautiful lake, not imaginatively but lit¬ 
erally, nestles among the mountains that sur¬ 
round it, and on a clear morning, just as the 
sun comes creeping over the Eastern horizon, an 
early riser can, from the vantage point of a boat 
or canoe well oi.it on the lake, count from twenty 
