942 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Dec. io, 1910. 
Five Foot M innows vs. the Truth. 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
You may think that the world of sport is in 
the expansive out of doors. Maybe, in New 
York. But come down en bas, a few hundred 
below, in the great Imperial and see how the 
fun transfers itself from the ditches of yellow 
waters to the hitches of yellow journalism. 
The Brawley News announced in triumph that 
the Imperial Valley region is a fisherman’s para¬ 
dise, and that salmon fishing in the Alamo and 
New rivers is better than it is in the streams 
of Canada or the lochs of Scotland, and local 
anglers are “burnishing up their rods and over¬ 
hauling tackle’’ to go after “thousands of game 
fighters’’ making their way up the rivers from 
Salton Sea. 
The unthinking Brawley man had.no sooner 
announced his scoop than the Press man at El 
Centro got out his kit and went on a still-hunt. 
Hear him: 
“Lest some careless person violate the game 
law in their eagerness to capture these ‘game 
fighters,’ the News gravely informs the public 
that ‘net fishing for salmon on Saturday and 
Sunday is forbidden in this State.’ 
“The game fish filling the streams and ditches 
of Imperial Valley is the critter called ‘Colorado 
River salmon,’ and is about as much like a sal¬ 
mon as the stork called ‘Colorado turkey’ is like 
a real turkey, and as fit for food.’’ 
This pronunciamento is made cock sure. For 
why? The Press man had hastily written to 
Dr. Jordan, of Stanford University, the highest 
authority on fish in the world, requesting infor¬ 
mation concerning the fish that Brawley anglers 
were said to be catching with salmon tackle, and 
elicited this reply: 
“Assuming that the fish infesting the ditches 
in your valley is the fish known as ‘salmon’ at 
Yuma and other points on the Colorado, it is a 
member of the minnow or dace family ( Cyprin - 
idee) and bears the scientific name Ptychoclieiliis 
Indus. Although the jaws are wholly without 
teeth, it is a voracious fish and reaches a large 
size, four or five feet long in the Colorado. A 
closely related species occurs in the Sacramento 
River, and is known as ‘pike.’ It is as little re¬ 
lated to the pike as your fish is to the salmon.” 
Whereupon, having victoriously escaped with 
the Brawley man’s basket of “salmon,” the Press 
man flaps his wings and capercailzies as follows: 
“Now we may brag that in the Colorado River 
and Imperial Valley ditches, minnows grow to 
the enormous size of five feet in length and a 
hundred pounds in weight, which is growing 
some for a minnow.” 
Never mind about the fish, the fishermen will 
attend to them; but now, honest, is it right for 
one sporting editor to put a crimp in another 
by writing to Jordan or anybody else on the side 
and giving another fellow’s fish story the lie? 
Fish stories are attackable only by something 
better and not by a general or specific denial. 
Francis Clarke. 
Salmon in November. 
St. Johns, N. F., Dec. 1 .—Editor Forest and 
Stream: Here is an unprecedented happening 
in Newfoundland that will interest anglers. Re¬ 
cently we had an exhibition here which was a 
veritable eye-opener to the ordinary citizen, as the 
exhibits, both industrial and agricultural, were 
pronounced by outside experts to equal anything 
in America. The game and fish commission had 
an exhibit of live trout, rainbow, loch leven and 
native, and they were a great attraction. There 
was also an exhibit of live salmon, and,the game 
commission (as it is the close season) gave per¬ 
mission to Superintendent of Wardens Croke to 
procure some in Placentia. He was authorized 
to net them, but when he got to the Four Mile 
Pool in Placentia, he bent on a silver doctor and 
had a try. To his surprise the fish were raven¬ 
ous and took the fly more eagerly than in July. 
This as far as I know is unprecedented. He 
caught several fine fish and brought them to the 
exhibition. 
The last few days several hundred brace of 
beautiful partridge have been thrown over the 
wharves. They were killed in the outposts and 
shipped in barrels to the grocers in St. Johns. 
The weather has been wet and close, so the 
birds heated and spoiled and had to be thrown 
away. Several tierces were ruined in this way. 
The game commission intends taking steps to 
stop this practice. 
I think we can safely promise anglers that 
next season the salmon will be more plentiful 
and larger than ever before. 
The commission will enforce more rigid pro¬ 
tection in the future. This year’s protection 
showed magnificent results in all the rivers. 
There is no reason why fish of forty or even 
fifty pounds would not be caught, as for the 
future they will get good chances to take to. the 
rivers in season. W. J. Carroll. 
THE TOP RAIL. 
Michigan is not alone in the setting of the 
fashions for the proper thing in clothing for the 
deer hunter. One of the Massachusetts papers, 
prior to the opening of the deer season there, 
published a list of “dont’s.” Here is one of 
them: 
“Don’t dress inconspicuously. Wear bright 
red or other lurid colors.” 
Bright colors did not save a Michigan man 
who, clad in red and green, was recently killed. 
In addition to fiery raiment, the hunter might 
save himself, or at least attract attention in the 
woods by trundling a small gasolene motor along 
with him or a wheelbarrow. Someone may yet 
advocate the coughing motorcycle as the proper 
mount for deerslayers, but a motor wheelbarrow 
should be more practicable, as the hunter could 
take his camp outfit along with him. Only a 
little ingenuity is required to connect the motor 
and the barrow wheel, thus leaving the steering 
only to the hunter, but supplying power as well 
as a noise like a freight train. 
■ * 1 * * 
There is nothing more useful at this season 
of the year than a little mejeurial ointment, the 
best home remedy for all the ailments with 
which firearms are afflicted following their con¬ 
sumption of nitro powders. I was out in the 
woods the other day in a wet snow storm, and 
in cleaning my gun that night, found my little 
box of the ill-smelling grease nearly exhausted. 
For obvious reasons I had long neglected to buy 
more, but next day I screwed up my courage and 
asked a drug clerk for two ounces. Just how 
much blue mass a ten-cent piece would buy I 
had forgotten, but he proffered one ounce in a 
tin box and asked if that would not be enough. 
I wanted two, one to be carried in my gun case, 
the other left at home, but did not explain, and 
the expression of pity and sympathy on the sales¬ 
man’s face as he wrapped up the two boxes was 
worthy of a better cause. 
Users of this grease should never fire a rifle 
with which it has been anointed until it has first 
been wiped out with a clean patch. The grease 
is very heavy and tenacious, and neglect of this 
precaution may result in injury to the barrel. 
I always clean the barrel thoroughly, then wipe 
out with the ointment, and before shooting run 
a dry cloth through a couple of times. I have 
a target revolver which has been fired thousands 
of times with nitro powder during the past fif¬ 
teen years, but it has always been preserved with 
mercurial ointment, and has never had a speck 
of rust in it, although it has always been used 
around salt water. 
* * * 
“Where can I purchase cloth ‘No Shooting 
Allowed’ notices?” asked a landowner. 
“Nowhere, I hope,” was the reply. 
It seems that inquiries had been made at sev¬ 
eral gun stores. Imagine yourself asking at such 
a place for these things, when the sale of guns 
and ammunition is keeping every employee awake 
nights now, keeping stock on hand. This is like 
asking for prohibition literature in a drinking 
place. 
Since the shooting season opened I have seen 
enough boards bearing these objectionable legends 
to build a large house. One field so bare that 
a rabbit could not hide in it was protected by 
twelve signs, while another place was. posted 
with notices printed in type so small that all I 
could make out from the road was ‘’‘Warning” 
and “Ten do'lars reward.” I am sure it referred 
to trespassing, but as I could not be certain 
without climbing over the fence for a closer in¬ 
spection, it might have announced the reward 
for any game that could be found on the place. 
I am going back some day to make sure. 
One thing I have noticed is that many of the 
best woodcock covers are not posted at all, while 
woods where a few squirrels and grouse may be 
seen in a day’s tramp are thickly dotted with 
signs. On one occasion I rode entirely around 
a promising bit of wooded hill country without 
finding a single place where I was free to enter, 
and yet there are men who shoot there regularly 
without interference and without asking permis¬ 
sion. 
* * * 
The old story of the dog that backed into a 
pond until only the tip of his nose was exposed, 
and then swam away, drowning all the .fleas that 
had annoyed him, must take a back seat. A 
Chicago man says he rids his dog of fleas by 
using a vacuum cleaner, but then he may be an 
agent for one of these machines, making use of 
the statement as an argument in favor of his 
wares. Grizzly King. 
