66 o 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Atril 25, 1908. 
and also the wisest. Approach the pool, if pos¬ 
sible, from below and begin casting with as 
long a line as you can handle with perfect con¬ 
trol. Do not overcast your water; it is the 
commonest and worst of faults. Begin just 
where the lip of the pool starts to break into 
the rapids below and gradually advance until 
you have searched the pool from side to side 
and up stream to about the middle of the pool. 
If you hook a fish lead him as quickly and 
quietly as possible down stream, where you can 
finish him at your leisure and without creating 
a commotion in the pool. Trout always lie with 
their heads up stream and can be most easily 
approached and securely hooked in this way. 
If unsuccessful get out of the stream, walk 
around the pool to its head, drop your flies 
where the water pours in and let them drift 
down and swing around into the back eddies. 
Should the result still be a blank and you have 
good reason to believe there are fish in the pool 
and that it has not recently been disturbed, get 
back out of sight, sit down for a rest or a 
smoke, change your flies, and after a few 
minutes try it again. Your flies should at all 
times strike the water as lightly as possible, and 
if you aim your cast at an imaginary point about 
two feet above the water, checking your cast 
slightly while still in the air, it will drop of its 
own weight and as lightly as a feather. When¬ 
ever possible, cast so your flies will strike the 
water first. This is easily accomplished by 
checking the cast with the tip of the rod held 
high. This causes the line to kink near the end 
of the cast and the flies will swing back a little 
toward you and strike lightly, while the line, in 
a reasonably short cast, may be held in the air 
and need not strike the water at all. 
Lou S. Darling, 
[to be concluded. 1 
Trout in North Carolina. 
Hendersonville, N. C., April n.— Editor 
Forest and Stream: The fishing season for 
trout has begun with us up here in the land of 
the sky and on Monday last I creeled twenty- 
two nice rainbows, enough for three meals for 
my family of seven. On Thursday a friend 
and myself drove out seven miles from Bryson 
City, Swain county, and we creeled sixty, about 
one-fourth of them brook trout, the rest rain¬ 
bow. We were unfortunate in finding a fisher¬ 
man was all day fishing ahead of us, so we 
caught no large trout, my twenty-two caught 
on Monday weighing as much as the sixty of 
Thursday. 
Spring weather now prevails and the woods 
are alive with song birds, for which I have a 
great fondness. 
We planted 17,000 rainbow trout on Tuesday 
in this county. Ernest L. Ewbank. 
Ice Out of Sebago Lake. 
The ice went out of Sebago Lake, Maine, on 
April 11, a trifle earlier than the average. 
An estimate based on former years gives the 
probable dates of the clearing of the large lakes 
as follows: Kezar, April 20; Belgrade, Marana- 
cook and Cobbossecontee, April 22; Grand and 
Clear Water, April 25; Moosehead and Range- 
ley, May 6. 
The Maine Fishing Season. 
Although in most parts of the country the 
sun is now shining warm and the grass turn¬ 
ing green, though wild flowers are thrusting up 
their heads through last year’s grass and weeds, 
and insects are coming out to play over the 
brooks and to feed the trout, winter still holds 
in Maine. There, in the woods, there is frost 
and snow, and lakes are bound in ice. But just 
think how many anglers there are who are hop¬ 
ing for the 1st of May, when they can begin to 
look for news of the breaking up of the ice and 
can start off on their spring trip for the salmon, 
the trout and the togue. 
It is probable that in Maine there are more 
trout and bigger trout than anywhere within the 
United States, and this is not so much because 
Maine is one of the big States, as because it 
has so much water and so few roads. Over 
much of the Maine wilderness the only way of 
traveling is by canoe, and that of course puts a 
limit on the traveling except in fishing or shoot¬ 
ing seasons. 
Of those who read Forest and Stream there 
are probably very many who have secret ponds 
and streams to which they go each year, and 
the knowledge of whose existence they jealously 
guard, but on the other hand there are perhaps 
a thousand of the best fishing places that are 
known to all, and that entirely satisfy ‘those who 
visit them. Such are those which lie in the 
Rangeley and Dead River region whose name 
is almost legion, and how good the fishing is 
here and how great the travel to get that fishing 
is shown by the fact that many towns have 
grown up almost wholly for the accommodation 
of sportsmen. In these towns of course there 
are hotels, and outside of the towns there are 
the camps, so called, which may be mere lean-tos. 
or may be elaborate structures of logs with all 
the comforts of home, including sidewalks o'f 
planks. With such comforts, w.here the man 
who is going fishing or shooting can no longer 
imagine that he is roughing it, has grown up 
a transportation service which is comfortable and 
modern. Pullman cars run every week day from 
Boston, and sleeping cars every day, these last 
reaching Farmington, the point of change in the 
early morning, and going thence to Rangeley, 
whence, diverge many routes by steamer or buck- 
board or stage. 
It used to be thought that only trout and 
salmon could be had in Maine, but it has long 
been known that perhaps the best black bass fish¬ 
ing in the country belongs right in the old Pine 
Tree State and sometimes, as in the case of 
Clearwater Pond, which is not so very far from 
Farmington, the same water contains salmon, 
lake trout, or togue, brook trout and black bass. 
The salmon and trout are ready to bite as 
soon as the ice leaves the pond, and take cither fly 
or troll, but later in the season, as the weather 
gets warmer they go down to deep water and 
can no longer be had. Then, too, there are the 
very famous Belgrade Lakes. The brooks and 
their mouths furnish great trout fishing all 
through the season it is said, and the black bass 
are plenty. 
It is hard to realize that early in the Revolu¬ 
tionary War. the hardy soldiers of the colonies 
passed through this portion of Maine, and in 
trying to haul their boats up Dead River lost 
a lot of imperishable things which have been 
found within a dozen or fifteen years. In 1895 
two or three bushels of hand moulded lead bul¬ 
lets were found in the bed of the stream, un¬ 
questionably lost in this way. Dr. Heber Bishop, 
of Boston, while making some interesting in¬ 
vestigations on the north branch of Dead River, 
found one of Arnold’s old camps with fireplaces, 
and also a bayonet; convincing evidence of the 
passage through here of an army, no doubt, on 
its way to Quebec. 
This region is almost on Maine’s western 
border; beyond that deeper in the wilderness 
arc numberless localities for fishing and hunt¬ 
ing where the sportsman can go, enduring all 
degrees of roughness and smoothness in his ac¬ 
commodations. Away over on the other side 
of the State as far ‘‘down cast’’ as it is possible 
to go, is Washington county, a famous fishing 
ground where last year—as every year—trout 
and salmon were taken in great numbers, some 
of the salmon weighing from five to eight and 
one : quarter pounds. Of these great numbers of 
fish we are told that at least seventy-five per 
cent, were returned uninjured to the water to 
grow larger and to furnish sport for other 
anglers. Some of these catches are as follows- 
Dr. Frank M. Johnson on Grand Lake one day late 
in May took 29 salmon; a Mr. Rogers, at Little- 
River, May 17, took 22 brook trout weighing 18 
pounds. The guests at a certain camp took over 200 
salmon May 24, and through the month of May 
no less than 1,300 salmon were caught. In 
August and September the salmon begin to be 
taken in the. streams. 
In only a short time the fishing in Maine 
will open and men will be going to these well 
known spots, Rangeley, Dead River, Kennebago, 
Tim Pond, Seven Pond, Grand Lake, and a hun¬ 
dred other equally well known points. There 
will be many trout and salmon caught and much 
joy among the anglers. The expenses of a trip 
to Maine are not heavy, for good accommoda¬ 
tions can be had for from $2 to $4 a day or 
from $10 to $15 per week. The man who is 
going to Maine for the first time, if such there 
be, will do well to make his arrangements be¬ 
forehand. 
Boston Anglers’ Club. 
For more than a year we have been asking 
prominent Boston anglers, every now and then, 
what were their intentions regarding the organ¬ 
ization of an anglers’ club. Replies were re¬ 
ceived, but they were not optimistic, and it was 
not until a fortnight ago that positive informa¬ 
tion was received. This came from Chicago, 
and was to the effect that the Anglers’ Club ol 
Boston had applied for membership in the 
National Association. 
The Boston club has been organized, and the 
Mayor has granted to members the privilege of 
practicing fly-casting on the historic Frog 
Pond in Boston Common. The club has about 
thirty members, with a limit of fifty, and appli¬ 
cations are being received every week. 
In view of the fact that the National fly- and 
bait-casting tournament will be held in New 
York in the summer of 1909, the anglers of the 
East may now feel that they will not be lonely, 
for with the representatives of the Newark. 
Boston, and Greenville (Pa.) clubs, the Anglers’ 
Club of New York will be assured of no little 
support from nearby centers. 
