♦ 
FIRST 
OUTDOOR 
JOURNAL 
Vol. LXXXVII 
MAY, 1917 
No. 5. 
TROUT HABITS, LURES AND THEIR USE 
BEING A RESUME OF THE LORE OF SOME REAL 
EXPERTS UPON THIS FASCINATING TOPIC 
N O matter how expert a theorist one 
may be upon the subject of how to 
catch trout, he is not entitled to be 
called an expert angler unless he “delivers 
the goods,” or, as Charles Zibeon Southard 
trenchantly remarks, unless he consistently 
catches fish—in all kinds of waters and un¬ 
der all conditions. There are those who 
do this, a vast majority of whom, be it ob¬ 
served, have never been afflicted with the 
morbus scribendi. That at once relegates 
the writer to the doubtful class. 
Yet it is certain that these real experts 
have some very definite ideas to guide 
them; and it should be interesting for the 
tyro to learn something of these ideas, as 
well as of practical value to him when suf¬ 
ficiently combined with actual experience. 
First of all, these men are generally after 
fish. Thus they seek to present any legiti¬ 
mate bait that is wanted, and are unalter¬ 
ably wedded to no one style of lure, though 
often preferring some particular method 
provided that it is successful under the pre¬ 
vailing conditions. 
At the Beginning of the Opening Season. 
I N early April—until the young maple 
leaves are half grown, as Nessmuk says 
—natural bait will be found more suc¬ 
cessful than the artificial fly. Trout are then 
lying quietly in rather deep pools and avoid 
the swift water. The best way to take 
them is with well-cleaned angle-worms or 
white grubs, the latter being Nessmuk’s 
preference. 
From tow'ard the latter part of May until 
July i, when new-born insects are con¬ 
tinually droping upon the water, is the fly- 
fisherman’s time. Most success is then gen¬ 
erally had from the riffles, or just at the 
foot of riffles. Though the largest trout 
are mostly caught in pools at any time, the 
“whoppers” monopolizing the deepest 
places, there may be a pair, male and fe¬ 
male, “at home” there. 
Upon occasion they will go foraging at 
night, chasing minnows up into the shallows. 
As the sun becomes hotter the fish take to 
By GEORGE PARKER HOLDEN 
the deeper pools again, and to spring-holes, 
or pools at the junction of some incoming 
smaller and colder stream. 
Natural Bait and Its Cultivation. 
N ATURAL bait is also more successful 
when the water is fouled (roily) after 
a heavy rain. The best method of 
cleansing, or scouring, angleworms is to 
keep them in moss in an earthen-ware 
flower-pot, in a cool place. The best moss 
is that having long roots, and such may 
be found on rocks where water is trickling 
through it. Large slabs of this moss may 
be peeled off the rocks, so cohesive is it. 
It should then be thoroughly washed and 
wrung out in water before receiving the 
worms. A teaspoonful of milk may be 
spread over it occasionally and a little 
sprinkling of water. Every few days re¬ 
move any dead worms. In about a week 
the worms have become toughened and 
very clear, almost transparent from having 
lost their earth. 
Other forms of natural bait include min¬ 
nows, grasshoppers, crickets, June-bugs, 
small frogs, field-mice, horse-flies and other 
real flies or their larvae (worms or grubs), 
meat and vegetables. Nessmuk’s large 
white grubs were probably the large ones 
found often in rotting stumps or logs. 
M INNOWS and worms are fished down¬ 
stream, with or without a single shot 
sinker, and allowed to run with the 
current; unless bottom fishing in still water, 
when a sizable sinker is used. Worms are 
tucked on the hook by catching the point 
just beneath the skin at several places and 
Standard Up-Winged Dry Fly, 
and Flat-Winged Wet Fly, in 
Most Useful Sizes: Nos. 12 
and 10 (3 and 5, New Scale.) 
leaving quite a bit of both ends free to 
wriggle. 
The smallest frogs are used and they 
should be hooked through both lips, as a 
minnow; unless still-fishing, when the lat¬ 
ter may be hooked'just underneath the 
dorsal fin, but hot so deeply as to injure it. 
Small grasshoppers are best, and the hook 
is inserted under the collar-joint back of the 
head and thrust through the length of the 
body to the tail; crickets similarly. Crickets 
are found under stones, especially on hills 
having a western exposure. An easy way 
to catch grasshoppers is to scare them into 
the water and then pick them from the 
surface. 
For night fishing it is not necessary to 
preserve the minnow alive in casting, and 
the large hook used may be first passed 
through the gills and then inserted length¬ 
wise of the body, near the tail, in such a 
manner as to curve the body and cause the 
bait to spin when drawn through the water. 
M AGGOTS, or gentles, are worms or 
grubs that are the larvae of an ex¬ 
tensive order of two-winged insects 
( diptera ), to which belong the house-fly, 
horse-fly (gad-fly, or breeze-fly) and the 
blue-bottle fly. The latter are among the 
largest of the varieties. The larvae can be 
kept in a box of cornmeal and should be 
hooked by the neck, or blunter, end. To 
grow these, Louis Rhead says, put a quar¬ 
ter pound of liver in a cigar box nearly 
filled with sawdust, expose to the sun and 
the flies will deposit their eggs on it. Leave 
in the open air, and the development is 
more rapid the warmer the temperature. 
The worms, or creepers, develop from the 
eggs in from three to six days and attain 
full growth in about another six days—an 
inch, more or less, according to the species 
of fly. The adult state lasts from two to 
four weeks. If another batch is required 
add more meat and other flies will deposit 
eggs and thus a supply of bait is always 
available. 
(CONTINUED ON PAGE 220) 
