Aug. 6 , 1910.] 
FOREST AND STREAM 
219 
Egyptian Fish Hooks. 
Newark, N. J., July 30.—Editor Forest and 
Stream: In the making of fish hooks in Euro¬ 
pean countries and in the United States there 
is just one way of producing the barb, and that 
is by slashing it out of the soft steel wire by 
the skillful operation of a hard steel knife blade 
formed so that the point of the barb will be 
thrown out straight, or slightly curved. This 
operation is performed before the hook is point¬ 
ed with a file, or ground on a wheel. The hard¬ 
ening, tempering and the blueing, bronzing or 
japanning come afterward. Anglers might na¬ 
turally suppose that cutting the barb out with 
a knife was the only way of producing this im¬ 
portant adjunct of the hook, but here is evidence 
that there is another, way. Here is a hook pur¬ 
chased from a trot line fisherman on the Nile. 
It is a product of Egypt and perhaps fish hooks 
have been made in this manner for several thou¬ 
sand years. 
The peculiarity of this hook is that the barb 
is swaged from the pointed wire with a blunt 
chisel and hammer, while the wire is held upon 
an anvil. It appears to be cold swaging and 
only a little filing or grinding is done after the 
one-sided barb is forced from the wire. While 
not as sharp nor as clearly defined as the barbs 
of our cheapest hooks, it is perhaps just as 
effective. The shank of the hook is roughly 
flatted and the hempen snood is most ingenious¬ 
ly braided around the shank for less than a 
quarter of an inch below the flat part. These 
hooks are evidently oil-tempered and are of 
sproat and Virginia form. They are not in the 
slightest degree kirbed; in fact, the flattened 
and ground point is brought back in line with 
the shank. On the opposite side from the 
swaged barb the hooks are quite flat. There is 
an inturn near the top of the shank giving what 
is known as the central or balanced draft. The 
hooks received ran from 7/0 to the size of tar¬ 
pon hooks or larger than 10/0, so it may be 
judged that the fishermen catch huge fish in the 
Nile. Harrimac. 
Louisiana Laws. 
New Orleans, La., July 30.— Editor Forest 
and Stream: Among some of the regulations 
in the new fish law' passed by the recent Legisla¬ 
ture of this State are the following: The ang¬ 
ler with rod, hook and line pays no license. He 
cannot sell his catch at any time. The closed 
season for fresh water fish is April i-June 1; 
salt water fish, May 15-Aug. 1. The angler is 
prohibited from catching in any one day more 
than fifty black bass, striped bass or white trout. 
He cannot use a seine except for the purpose of 
catching minnows or shrimp for bait. The seine 
must be of small mesh. The commercial fisher¬ 
men must procure a license from the game com¬ 
mission to seine at the rate of $3 for all seines 
under and $50 for seines over 200 feet in length. 
The professional fishermen must observe the 
closed season. No black bass, green trout, bar- 
fish, sac-a-lait or other species of fresh water 
fish can be sold between March 1 and June 1. 
All trammel and gill nets found by wardens are 
subject to immediate confiscation and destruction. 
The commission is empowered to build and 
operate fish hatcheries, but is limited in the 
amount to be thus spent annually. On the re¬ 
quest of the police jury of any parish the com¬ 
mission must stop all seining in the waters of 
said parish. The law provides for private fish 
hatcheries, but the fish cannot be sold during 
the closed season. Seiners are prohibited from 
beating or pounding the water for the purpose 
of frightening the fish into nets. No person is 
allowed to build any rack or screen in any bayou, 
lake or river to prevent the passage of fish. All 
persons using water for irrigation purposes must 
have their intake pipes screened in order to keep 
fish from being drawn therein. This does not 
apply to the Mississippi River. 
Reports from the various fishing places during 
the past week were to the effect that more 
fish had been landed than for some time. The 
rain and squalls have subsided to some extent. 
A good many redfish, Spanish mackerel, speck- 
EGYPTIAN FISH HOOK. 
Reproduced exact size. 
led trout, sheepshead, green trout, striped bass 
and other varieties were caught. The clubs at 
the Rigolets, Lake Catherine, Lookout, Chef 
Menteur and other places were filled with guests 
during the week. A number of New Orleans 
people are spending the summer at Waveland, 
Bay St. Louis, Pass Christian, Biloxi, Gulfport, 
Mississippi City and enjoying fishing excursions 
in the bayous and Mississippi Sound. 
A party of amateur fishermen caught a shark 
in Lake Pontchartrain some miles from Amite 
City which weighed 250 pounds and measured 
seven feet six inches. This big fish had worried 
the men a great deal previously, carrying off 
their bait, and they went prepared for the shark. 
The party was composed of Jim Wellhausen, E. 
Dees and Henry Haybig. F. G. G. 
Must Respect the Law. 
“What are those queer noises?” asked the 
stranger who was crossing the rustic bridge. 
“Bullfrogs, Mister,” elucidated the freckled lad 
on the rail. 
“H’m! And are they croaking ‘Jug-er-rum’ 
like they always do?” 
“No, Sir, they couldn’t croak ‘Jug-er-rum’ here. 
This is a prohibition State.”—Chicago News. 
American Fishes in New Zealand.* 
At the commencement it is, I think, appro¬ 
priate to say something about the geographical 
position and physical features of this little coun¬ 
try in the far away South Pacific, which is do¬ 
ing much valuable work for its people by the 
introduction into its waters of a number of the 
best sport and commercial fishes from the North¬ 
ern Hemisphere. 
New Zealand, situated between latitudes 34 
and 47 degrees south, in the Pacific Ocean, con¬ 
sists of three main islands, the total area of 
which is about 104,000 square miles. A large 
extent of the country is mountainous, particu¬ 
larly in the Middle Island, which is intersected 
along almost its entire length (about 500 miles) 
by a range of mountains known as the Southern 
Alps, the highest peak, Mount Cook (the Maori 
or native name is “Aorangi,” meaning “cloud 
piercer”), being 12,400 feet. The summer snow 
line on these mountains is about 7,000 feet above 
sea level. 
As would be expected from a country with 
such physical characteristics, New Zealand pos¬ 
sesses a very fine system of rivers and lakes. 
In the South Island the larger rivers all origi¬ 
nate among snow-clad mountains of hard rock 
formations; in a good many instances their tribu¬ 
taries flow into mountain lakes and from there 
down through the low country into the sea. 
Over twenty rivers, taking their rise among the 
glaciers of the Southern Alp range, flow down 
into the Pacific Ocean on either coast. In parts 
of the North Island the same formations pre¬ 
vail to a large extent, but many of the rivers 
run for the greater length of their course through 
low country. 
This country, with its unique flora and fauna, 
has also the extraordinary peculiarity that with 
its magnificent water system it has no indigenous 
fresh-water fishes of any sporting or commercial 
value. Eels ( Anguilla australis ) are found 
everywhere, also a few inferior fishes such as 
the kokopu ( Galaxias fasciatus) , but the only 
representative of the Salmonidce is the little 
smelt ( Retropinna richardsoni ) and the native 
grayling ( Prototroctes oxyrhynchus) , called by 
the natives “upokororo.” This interesting fish, 
however, seems to be on the verge of extermina¬ 
tion, owing to the introduction of trout into the 
rivers it inhabits, to mining and to clearing of 
the vegetation from the banks of the rivers for 
farming purposes. 
The early colonists who emigrated to New 
Zealand from Great Britain were very much 
surprised to find a country with such fine rivers, 
lakes and streams, but with no fish of any value 
in them. In a few years the question of intro¬ 
ducing some of the British Salmonidce was con¬ 
sidered, and in 1864 the matter assumed definite 
shape when the Otago Provincial Council took 
it up and voted a sum of money for the impor¬ 
tation of Atlantic salmon eggs ( Salmo salar), 
and in 1868 the first lot of English brown trout 
(Salmo fario ) eggs arrived in the colony. Since 
that time the English brown trout and the Loch 
Leven trout ( Salmo levenenps) have been suc¬ 
cessfully acclimatized, and the brown trout now 
abounds in many of the rivers, particularly those 
in the South Island. 
* By L. F. Ayson, Chief Inspector of Fisheries for New 
Zealand; paper presented before the Fourth International 
Fishery Congress. 
