Forest and Stream 

Copyright, 1906, by Forest and Stream Publishing Co. 


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VOR TS oA LURAY SAN UARY 20,"1906; 

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The object of this journal will be to studiously 
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ation, and to cultivate a refined taste for natural 
objects. Announcement in first number of 
ForrEsT AND STREAM, Aug. 14, 1873, 
NOTICE TO SUBSCRIBERS. 
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STREAM of the issues of January 6 and 13, at the 
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request. 
. 
WOODS IN: SILVER. 
THE woods are beautiful at all seasons of the 
year, but perhaps never more beautiful than in 
winter. Then, it is true, there are no green 
leaves, no nodding flowers, no brilliantly colored 
fungus, no singing birds, yet lacking all these 
things, there is the unspeakable charm of the 
silent woods. In the wet places the black and 
gray stems of the alders stand thickly interlaced, 
but through them, beyond, rises the brown leaf- 
covered slope, where great forest trees stand 
silent and straight and tall. The brook, whose 
black quiet waters twist and turn among the tree 
trunks, is fringed with ice along its bank, and 
when a little bar or ripple occurs, that is frozen 
all across and under the ice, is seen the never- 
ending motion of the white bubbles of air car- 
ried down by the water. A whisper is heard far 
in this frosty air. The roar of a rising grouse 
would almost shock the hearer. 
The woods are silent—but not after your com- 
ing. Your footsteps rustle harshly through the 
dry leaves, and when you descend to cross the 
brook, frost crystals break noisily under the foot. 
It is well to stop on some knoll and sitting down 
on a convenient log or stump to use eyes and 
ears. One listens in vain for the sound of a 
passing footfall or the cry of a nearby bird. Yet, 
sometimes the scream of a distant hawk may be 
heard or the tinkle of a jay’s call far away, or 
the dark form of a slow flying crow is seen 
against the sky. Sometimes a small detachment 
of the winter woods livers may appear, and the 
flutter of their wings is heard as they pass from 
tree trunk to tree trunk—all silent except the 
chickadee, who may sound his cheerful note in 
the coldest weather. 
Jan. 14 in New York and southern New Eng- 
land opened with the woods clad in silver and 
gems. During the night a sleety rain had fallen 
and every twig and branch and weed stem and 
grass blade over a vast stretch of country was 
cased in ice. It was cold, too, and when the fresh 
breeze sprang up and the heavy foliage of the 
trees swayed to and fro, and then when the sun 
came out and lighted up the marvelous garb in 
which nature was for once arrayed, the scene was 
one of astonishing splendor and brilliancy. 
Beautiful though it was to the eye, one could 
not forget that this casing of the world in uni- 
versal ice meant sorrow and suffering to not a 
few of the wild creatures. Now for a time the 
whole food supply was locked up, and quail and 
partridge, rabbit and squirrel were as absolutely 
barred from the good things that they commonly 
seek, as is the little child who. on a winter’s 
night stands in front of the confectioner’s shop 
and hungrily looks at the good things just be- 
yond the transparent pane. We may hope that 
before the pangs of hunger become too severe, a 
few hours of genial sunlight or of warm rain 
may have opened these locks and again admitted 
nature’s hungry children to her bounteous store- 
house. 
THE STRIPED BASS. 
THE introduction of the marine striped bass 
into the waters of the Pacific and its establish- 
ment and development there have already been 
noted in these columns as one of the great 
triumphs of the United States Fish Commission 
and of the California State Fish Commission, 
Originally known only in Atlantic waters, the 
bass was in 1879 and 1882 carried across the con- 
tinent by the enterprise of the two commissions 
named, and now, as Dr. Bean notes in his chapter 
on the striped bass in Mr. Rhead’s new work on 
“The Basses,” the yearly catch of striped bass in 
California, both commercially and for sport, is 
nearly equal to the yield in Atlantic waters. More 
than this, so far as economic considerations are 
involved, the San Francisco household has much 
the advantage of dwellers in New York as to 
price, for while New York is paying twenty to 
thirty cents a pound, the price in the San Fran- 
cisco market is only a few cents, the wholesale 
price at certain seasons ranging from three-quar- 
ters of a cent to a cent and a half a pound. Cali- 
. fornia has no close season, but the size of the 
fish that may be taken is restricted; no fish of 
less than three pounds may be sold or had in pos- 
session—a rule which is in shining contrast with 
that which has so long prevailed in Atlantic 
coast markets, where tens of thousands of young 
bass, many of them scarcely more than six inches 
long, have been marketed. Such foolish destruc- 
tion has been a potent factor to diminish the 
supply, notwithstanding the observance of a close 
season coincident with the breeding season. 
The striped bass has proved as popular with 
the anglers of the Pacific as it has always been 
(VOL. LEVIL—No. 3. 
1 No. 346 Broadway, New York. 
in the East; and numerous clubs of bass fisher- 
men have been formed. The fish has given 
pleasure to thousands. 
In marked contrast with Pacific coast condi- 
tions of plenty, is the dearth of striped bass in 
many Eastern waters where they were once so 
abundant as to stimulate the setting apart of 
choice bits of rocky coast by angling clubs, some 
of which have long been famous. Records col- 
lected by Mr. Daniel B. Fearing for the volume 
referred to, show a disheartening deterioration 
of the sport, as indicated by club scores. The 
West Island Club, of West Island, R. I., for ex- 
ample, whose fishing grounds were heralded by 
Genio C. Scott, and which has kept record for 
more than forty years, shows such a dwindling 
from a yield of 2,406 bass in 1874 to a paltry 
eleven in 1904. The Cuttyhunk Club, of Cutty- 
hunk Island, Mass., was organized in 1865, and 
in that year the members took 1,174 bass. Of 
recent years the catch has deteriorated to such 
a discouraging point as the score of two fish taken 
in 1902. The Pasque Island Club, of Pasque 
Island, Mass., shows a fluctuation almost as 
great. In 1868 tHe score was 905, in 1902 it was 
forty. The Monument Club, of Bourne, Mass., 
took 633 bass in 1878, and reports very few fish 
killed during the last ten years. The Beaver 
Tail Club, of Conanicut, R. I., recorded 104 fish 
for 1890, and practically none in recent seasons. 
The Graves Point Club, of Newport—at a point 
where the largest striped bass ever taken on rod 
and reel was caught—a fish weighing 70 pounds 
several hours after its capture by Mr. William 
Post—has not thought it worth while of recent 
years to keep a record. The Southside Sports- 
men’s Club, of Oakdale, Long Island, gives a 
similar depressing statement for late seasons. 
Indeed the striped bass fishing on the New 
England coast is a thing of the past. To this 
unhappy condition many causes have contributed, 
among them the marketing of vast numbers of 
immature fish; the illegal netting in some waters ; 
the presence of innumerable lobster pots in 
others, seining for menhaden, pollution of waters 
by oil and other factory pollution, the firing of 
heavy guns of forts and warships, and the 
diminution of menhaden, shrimp and young fish 
which form the food of the bass. 
Tue American Scenic and Historic Preserva- 
tion Society, founded by the late Andrew H. 
Green, has issued a report in which is reviewed 
its admirable work in a cause which should ap- 
peal to every one who is not hopelessly sordid or 
whose eyes have not been totally blinded to the 
beauty and majesty of the works of nature. The 
purpose of the Society is to mark with permanent 
memorials places which are associated with im- 
portant events in the history and development of 
the country; and to preserve and defend from 
mutilation and ruin by vandals natural objects of 
beauty and grandeur. 
