
Speckled Trout of the Adirondacks 
A Tale Wherein Angling Experiences, Nature 
Lore and Round Information Combine in 
a Particularly Pleasing Manner — Part 1 
the very name sends through the 
ardent angler! These beautiful 
fish, that are becoming more and more 
rare with the advancing years, still 
hold first place in the hearts of many 
anglers despite the fact that their 
dangerous rivals, the brown trout, are 
making noticeable inroads on 
the popularity of the Amer- 
ican charr. 
There are still some lakes 
and streams within twelve 
hours of New York City where 
Salvelinus fontinalis reigns su- 
preme, and these places are 
the joy and delight of the 
‘native trout” angler who is 
in on the secret. In the north- 
ern wilderness of New York 
State there is a brook and a 
stream that stand out in my 
memory as being the best of 
trout fishing waters that are 
open to public fishing in this 
State. 
Dog Pond and Brandy 
Brook—two names to conjure 
with. The first calls to mind 
with startling vividness a long, hard 
hike with a heavy pack, through a 
wilderness peopled with deer, coon and 
foxes. There is only one way to reach 
Dog Pond and that is by leg power; 
but the energy expended, the aching 
legs and back contracted, are fully re- 
paid when the eye first rests on the 
pond which is really nothing more than 
a gigantic spring. Nestled in the hills, 
it is one of Nature’s beauty spots. The 
shore line on two sides is virgin forest, 
a seemingly impenetrable wall. On the 
other two sides, sad to relate, the 
lumberman has taken his toll, but the 
ugly scar left by the lumbermen has 
been softened by the elements, and the 
gigantic boulders that skirt the edge 
of this part of the pond lend a touch 
of grandeur to the scene that strikes 
deep into the heart. 
Bike very trout! What a thrill 
HE trout of Dog Pond!—were there 
ever such brilliant, red - spotted 
beauties anywhere else on this earth? 
Beautiful, large, well conditioned Dog 
Pond trout are prize fish well worth 
the taking. 
The scene changes as my thoughts 
By RAY BERGMAN 
go to Brandy Brook. There comes to 
mind the distant call of the loon, laugh- 
ing away the hours, the whistle of a 
frightened deer, the spitting, snarling 
fight of raccoons and the “swish, 
swash” of the fly rods in the inky black 
night with the occasional splash of a 
hooked trout. Then over it all the 

The smile the out-of-doors brings. 
glamour of romance, as the moon rises 
slowly over the distant hill and reveals 
nature at her best and man partaking 
of her to his heart’s content. 
M* experiences at Dog Pond have 
been many and varied. The dif- 
ferent tactics I have had to use in order 
to outwit the wily denizens of this pond 
have been a great addition to my fund 
of trout lore. I will try to set down 
a few of these experiences as they hap- 
pened,-and if they add anything to 
your knowledge of fishing I will feel 
more than repaid for my poor efforts. 
The form of the pond is almost circu- 
lar except for the two extremes, the 
southeast and northwest corners. At 
these points it extends out into two 
bays, both being very shallow. A small 
brooklet enters the southeast bay and 
this brooklet is always filled with fin- 
gerlings in the lower end and fry in 
the upper end. As the trout grow in 
size they move out in the shallow bay 
which is filled with weeds. Here they 
stay, growing rapidly on the plentiful 
supply of water insects and tiny craw- 
fish, until they get about eight inches 
long. At this time they are seized with 
the desire to go into deep water and 
move out into the deep circular part of 
the pond where they spend the rest of 
their lives, very rarely going into shal- 
low water again except for short excur- 
sions or when they travel up the small 
brooklet again, to spawn, in the fall of 
the year. Of course I do not 
believe that all the trout 
of Dog Pond spawn in this 
brooklet, for that would be a 
physical impossibility, but I 
do believe that it is only the 
trout that go through the 
stages I have mentioned who 
survive the rapacious appe- 
tites of the large trout. This 
idea is fostered by the indis- 
putable fact that one never 
catches a trout under eight 
inches in the pond proper, 
whether bait or fly is used. 
I have purposely used very 
tiny minnow hooks and the 
smallest pieces of bait, and 
never had the aforesaid state- 
ment disproved. 
The northwest bay is the 
outlet and is devoid of trout, except 
on rare occasions, mostly during the 
high water of the springtime when 
some trout come up the outlet brook 
and pass through the bay on their way 
to the pond. The outlet runs into 
Cranberry Lake and there are some 
trout that make their way the whole 
distance from this big lake to the pond. 
This was proved last year, when Walter 
Chisholm, of Cranberry Lake, caught 
a three-pound rainbow in Dog Pond. 
As Dog Pond is natural native trout 
water and has never been stocked, this 
seems proof conclusive. 
About in the center of the pond is a 
rock shallow—that is, shallow for this 
lake—the water being about twenty 
feet deep. This is one of the very 
best places for large trout and has 
netted me many a_two-pounder or 
better. 
HAVE in mind a rainy day one 
July, when the trout seemed abso- 
lutely lifeless. Not a rise could I get 
though I used faithfully every fly in 
my book and every dry fly in my box. 
I then resorted to night-walkers and 
A59 
