This book has many accounts and practises in catching common fish such as Bass, Pike, Trout, Mackerel etc. It is also Illustrated and detailed so that it's easy to refer and follow.
These fishes belong to the sub-order Malacop-terygii, of which we have given a short definition in dealing with the salmon family, and they have often been associated with the herrings in zoological c...
The gar-fish, with its near allies the saury (Hemirhamphus) and the flying fish (Exococtus), which are associated under the family Scombresocid*, represents a group of Teleosteans of the sub-order Per...
Our once well-stocked rivers are rapidly declining both in volume and fish. The former, in consequence of improved systems of drainage and increased consumption of water; the latter, by over-netting a...
May is the best month for tarpon fishing, although good sport may be obtained earlier if the weather is warm enough. In June the rainy season sets in, and it becomes hot, while the fish, being heavy w...
When about four miles out in the gulf, the fish suddenly alters his course to due north, and finally enters Boca Grande Pass. Here are many more fishers who greet the apparition with jeers and shouts;...
Among them is a 17-feet hammer-head upon which the harpooner has had his eye for some time, and after which he now proceeds; straight towards the boat comes the hammer-head, his huge proportions denot...
Natural History And Classification The carp family is very richly represented in the fresh watei^ of India and Burma, but, with a few exceptions, by genera totally different from those with which w...
There are many varieties of fish in Indian waters, some few good for the table, but the larger number poor as compared with our fish in Great Britain. Most of the fish take ground bait only, and it...
The total catch was four fish over ten pounds each, and nine others averaging a little over four pounds each. We could not carry all home, so buried some and heaped a cairn of stones over them. We wer...
Fishing-rods, reels, and tackle employed in mahseer fishing may be described as similar to those used for salmon fishing, and only differ from them in a few details, such as balance in rods, and stren...
Gut, undoubtedly, is our oldest friend and a true one. For light spoon traces as well as for fly it should be used, and must not be left out of the tackle list, as it always comes in useful. It should...
The Esocidey with the pike and their allies, constitute a group, or sub-order, the Haplomi, distinguished from the Malacopterygii by the absence of the so-called mesocoracoid arch or bony bridge on th...
Pike, jack, or pickerel, as the same fish is variously called according to its age and size, are the only recognised species of Esox-lucius found in the rivers and lakes of Great Britain, or known in ...
Pike are monogamous; the males and females pair in January or early February, so that, during these months and March, when one is caught the other may often be captured. The females spawn in March o...
It is a strange thing with some pike, or rather with the captors of them, that the weight of fish they catch increases largely after death in a most marvellous manner, and quite irrespective of their ...
The fecundity of pike is amazing. Frank Buck-land tells of one which was caught on April 2,1870, in one of the Norfolk Broads, and sent to him. It weighed 32 lbs., and measured 3 feet 8 inches; the ro...
The pike ranks, in the estimation of most anglers, as one of the gamest and most sport-giving of all fresh-water fish. A 12-pounder in its prime, ue. from October to February, will give as much s...
There are plenty of low-priced lines to be had, but they are not cheap because of little cost; they are badly made and untrustworthy, consisting of a core of shoddy material, around which silk is plai...
Most anglers consider spinning a more artistic way by which to capture pike than other methods, and as I have described the rod and tackles necessary for pursuing this delightful branch of the art o...
24.- Chertsey Bridge. 25.- Live-Bait Snap Fishing. The last, and possibly the best artificials I shall mention, are phantom-baits ; they are made in various sizes and colours, of sil...
These spiny-rayed or Acanthopterygian fishes, of which our common perch is the type, are distinguished among their relatives in having only one or two spines in the anal fin, the allied Cen-trarchid* ...
The freshwater perch (Perca-fluviatilis) is a typical member of the Percidae family, and is not only one of the most beautiful of the fish which inhabit our rivers and lakes, but ranks as a prime favo...
These fishes represent in our fresh waters the great sub-order Ostariophysi^ soft-rayed Teleosteans, with the mesocoracoid arch present as in the Salmonids, with the ventral fins inserted far behind t...
1. Carp X Crucian Carp (Cyprinus Kollarii) Barbels as in the carp, but smaller; scales in lateral line 35 to 38. 2. Roach X Bream (Abramis Buggenhagii) Anal fin with 12 to 17 branched rays; s...
The Barbel (Barbus vulgaris), an inhabitant of the rivers of Central Europe, is very locally distributed in England (Thames, Lea, Trent, Yorkshire, Wales), and absent from Scotland and Ireland. Specim...
There are exceptions to all rules, but as a rule I should not advise an angler to waste much time in carp fishing-life is too short and the art of catching carp takes too long to learn, and there are ...
As for the best times and seasons, Mr. Overbeck says in the water he fishes the last two weeks in September and the first two in October are the only weeks in the year he does any good; he has caught ...
I was fishing for bream with a 14-oz. rod, a running line of plaited silk about the thickness of cotton, a fine gut ledger trace, and a No. 5 round-bend hook mounted on very fine gut. Old George had b...
It is a curious fact that, although there are plenty of barbel in the Thames and some of its tributaries, it is rare for anglers to have good sport with this strong and handsome fish in such rivers as...
Some anglers cannot understand why fishing for roach should be such fascinating sport to so many anglers; there are probably a score of roach anglers for every one who prefers fishing for perch, chub,...
An excellent way of roach fishing is ledgering with float tackle and ground bait. The white paste bait with the hook in it is embedded in a bit of ground bait pressed round it; this is carefully and g...
I think the most beautiful rudd I have ever seen were fish of about 1¾ lbs. to over 2 lbs. in weight, which we caught in the Fleet, near Felixstowe Ferry. The scales were a clear golden yellow, the fi...
The chub and dace have one great attraction for the fly fisher, they both delight in feeding on flies and other insects which float down on the surface. In shape the fish are very much alike, but are ...
Where dace are plentiful and run to herring size -a pound dace is a rare fish-they give excellent sport to the young fly fisher, so most of the angling books tell us. My experience is that dace are of...
If tench would take the fly like other of the so-called coarse fish it would be introduced into waters all over the country, as it is a handsome, vigorous fish, which fights well for liberty when hook...
In fishing for bream I have found the same kind of tackle and baits as referred to in my notes on tench fishing answer very well. It is quite a mistake to suppose that because bream grow to many pound...
The eel and the conger are the well-known British representatives of a large sub-order of Teleostean fishes, known as Apodes^ on account of the constant absence of the ventral or pelvic fins. It is, h...
In Shropshire and Herefordshire, when the Onny and the Lugg were coloured after a storm, I have had many a good day's sport fishing with wasp grub or worm for eels, although I confess I have never got...
As is well known eels breed in the sea. The young eels-elvers, as they are called-ascend in April and May. The adult eels descend to the sea to breed from June to December. The elvers only run on spri...
The fishes of this genus are easily recognised by their feebly compressed body and short, rounded head, both covered with large, strongly overlapping scales; the infcro-lateral eyes, better visible fr...
The relations and systematic position of this group of fishes, so important from an economic point of view, have been, and are still, a subject of contention among ichthyologists. Having no spines to ...
Also called green cod, black pollack, saith, and sillock. The three dorsal fins are low, the second the longest at the base, but shorter than the first anal fin. The lower jaw projects a little beyond...
This fish, which grows to a length of three feet, is recognisable among the species with the base of the anal fin considerably longer than that of the second dorsal, by its very prominent lower jaw, t...
This family, one of the largest of the class Pisces, and formed almost exclusively of marine species, is very nearly related to the true perches; the characters on which they have been separated from ...
Acanthopterygians with non-protractile, beak-like upper jaw; fusiform body, without or with very small, smooth scales; a spinous dorsal fin of slender spines, folding into a sheath, and longer soft do...
Tunnies and bonitoes are closely related to the mackerels, differing in the presence of enlarged scales on the pectoral region, forming a corselet, and of a longitudinal keel on each side of the cauda...
The class fishes is divided primarily into three sub-classes: Teleostomes (the bony fishes and sturgeons), Chondropterygians (sharks, rays, chimae-ras), and Cyclostomes (lampreys and hag-fish). All th...
Little by little the sport of sea-fishing is attracting the attention in this country that has so long been accorded to its claims elsewhere. In almost every Mediterranean country long rods have for a...
It may be presumed, though the chronology and evolution of sea-fishing as a sport form no part of the scope of these remarks, that sea-fishing from boats came before sea-fishing from the shore. I neit...
For mackerel fishing in this way from a rowing-boat I should strongly recommend the use of a rod, a 10-feet trout-rod for preference. It imparts an element of sport to what is otherwise a not very spo...
Now, it will at once occur to the reader, particularly if he is an Irishman, that it may be necessary to catch your mackerel before you cut artistic baits out of the side of its tail. The float las...
1 Since writing these lines. I find that my friend, the late Mr. J. C. Wilcocks, also asserts (in The Sea Fisherman, fourth edition, p. 126) this superiority of the left-hand float. As I always h...
A little tide is essential for drift-line fishing, the principle of which is to anchor the boat in the tideway, and let the line and hook, without any lead to weigh it down, drift away on the tide. Th...
Bass and pollack are, in fact, the other fish caught by the methods already recommended for mackerel, though with heavier tackle in proportion to their greater size and strength. In fishing for them w...
Well, it is my business to put the reader in possession of the most killing methods of taking the chief sporting fishes of our seas and not to quibble about names. Drift-lining is, in fact, also pr...
The behaviour of a pollack when hooked is entirely different from that of any of the other fishes so far mentioned, different indeed from any other familiar fish in our seas. If the action of a shark ...
I have just used the expression pollack grounds, from which it will be surmised that this fish has its favourite haunts, and that, in order to catch pollack it is first necessary to find them. The f...
There is a tackle, known as the sprawl or chopstick, of which some account must here be given. There are two rigs of this tackle, the Kentish and the Dartmouth. In the Kentish, the form seen al...
Conger fishing, another and distinct amusement, is also best practised from an anchored boat, though there are several piers and harbours from which moderately large conger are to be caught in August ...
I have here described conger fishing as a night sport, and so indeed it is as a rule, though there is no reason why congers, large enough to give the amateur sport, should not be caught in daylight. I...
And now we come to that calm-water fishing for bass and others of the fish already named, to which the attention of the seasick has been specially invited. It has just been said that the bass likes...
1 I show a square hook here for the sake of variety, though the round bends have latterly given me greater satisfaction. 75.- Getting To Work 76.- Bass Caught In Alde. Such is bass fi...
This, then, concludes what I have to say about fishing from boats, but I do not want to take leave of the subject without a few words of caution on the subject of general procedure and behaviour in su...
Those who own small yachts, by the way, might do worse than invest in a correspondingly small trammel. The trammel is virtually a net wall, standing about six feet high, and doing its work in the dark...
A boat may, of course, be to all intents and purposes a fixed position, provided the boat be sufficiently large and the water sufficiently smooth. I have fished from a 6000-ton steamer in an Australia...
The most extraordinary rock-fishing-we will for convenience take our fixed positions in this order : rocky shores, sandy shores, and piers-that I ever took part in was on the coast of Australia. I...
Where there is a sandy bottom immediately within the rock-angler's reach, a leger-tackle for flat-fish or whiting will perhaps be found to answer best, but as the principle and management of this tack...
The rapidity with which, particularly during the second half of the flood-i.e. often the best time for prawning-the sea may come swirling round those rocks and cut off the careless and absorbed prawne...
Fishing from a sandy shore is practised under quite different conditions. In the first place it may for the most part be regarded as an autumn and winter, and not as a summer, pastime. The fish caught...
Thus, the setting, or shooting, as it is generally called, of a long line-variously known as trot, spiller, or bulter-might conceivably afford sport to some, and it is to the sandy coast that...
Fishing from piers and harbours is an almost distinct branch of the sport, so many little modifications are necessary under the altered conditions. Much depends, in the first place, on whether the pie...
When there are large mackerel round a pier, as sometimes occurs in hot summers at Bournemouth and elsewhere on the south coast, the drift-line is a killing method of fishing, but it is essential to fi...
There is a method of fishing from harbours or quays on tidal rivers that is distinct from anything that has previously been described in these sea-fishing notes. It will be more or less welcomed by th...
The grey mullet, about the most difficult fish to catch in British seas, is essentially the property of the harbour-fisher, for this fish delights in the soft food to be found alongside quays and dock...
It seems desirable that a few notes should here be given on one or two of the more uncommon natural baits, of which the sea-angler from time to time avails himself. Every form of fishing has its own p...
For some mysterious reason the law on all sporting matters is complicated and difficult of clear statement, but the worst of all is the law of fishing. The number of the Acts of Parliament, the abomin...
With the second the confusion begins; it is called a free fishery. Naturally persons have considered this means a fishery where any one could fish, but the meaning is very different. What the precise ...
There are also provisions forbidding taking salmon out of season, or even in season if in an unfit state to be taken, technically called unclean, or of young salmon before they have migrated to the ...
These are the main statutory provisions of the Fishery Acts. There are also certain matters in other Acts that should be noticed. By the Larceny Law Consolidation Act, 1861 (24 and 25 Vict., c. 96), i...
In prosecutions before justices, which are the usual form that fishery litigation takes, the prosecutor, if he is the tenant, must remember that, unless he has a lease of the fishing rights by a deed,...
Where no figures are inserted no licences are issued. The figures are the maximum. By-laws have also been made as to the annual close time for trout and char in certain districts. When the district...
Another rule of the Scotch law of great practical importance is that to use any new or unusual mode of catching fish is illegal. It is not illegal to use net and coble so constantly as practically to ...
The rules as to fixed engines, bag nets, and weirs are much the same as those in England. No fixed engine that was not in use in 1862, and no bag net not in use in July 1863, can be legally used. All ...
An Agreement made and entered into this day of 19 , between A B of (hereinafter called the lessor), of the one part, and C D of (hereinafter called the tenant), of the other part If the agreement i...
An Agreement made and entered into the day of 19 , , between A B of (hereinafter called the lessor), of the one part, and CD of [or C D , E F , and G H , members of and on behalf of the Society] (here...
This Indenture, made this day of , 19 , between A B , of (hereinafter called the lessor), of the one part, and C D , of [or E F , G H , etc., of , members of, and on behalf of, the Fishery Society], (...
Chapter I. The Tarpons And The Gar-Fish. The Tarpons (Elopid)
