HILL TROUT STREAMS.
AWRITER in last Saturday's Times raises the interest- ing question of what can be done to improve the trout. fishing in mountain streams. To the haughty sportsman it is not a question which matters greatly. His quarry is the salmon, who lives in the lochs and broad river of the strath, and not in the burns of the glens which have no name pro- nounceable by him, and appear in the Ordnance map as a jumble of wild Gaelic syllables with the prefix Alt. If he wants brown trout, be prefers to look for them in the brimming 'waters of a Hampshire meadow, where two- and three-pounders may be found in his creel, and not among rock pools where anything over a pound is a rarity indeed. But for the humbler angler the question is a vital one. Salmon rivers and chalk streams are, after all, few in number, and to fish them costs money; but the name of the hill streams is legion. Wales, North England, Ireland, and Scotland show several in almost every parish, and inthe mountainous parts every half-mile of strath adds some hill-born tributary to the river. In angling, as in most things to-day, the demand is beginning to outrun the supply. Among the finer sports, trout-fishing may stand with rock-climbing as peculiarly the "treasure of the humble." With the wet-fly in bill streams it costs little except the fisherman's board at the nearest inn, for most of such waters are free fishing, or at any rate open to any one who cares to proffer a civil request to the owner. As things stand, the trout are small, averaging, say, seven or eight to the pound ; but they are often plentiful, are always lusty fighters, and, save in the most barren rock stream, are in excellent con- dition. Assuredly a day on a hill stream is not to be despised, even by those lordly amateurs who every year kill great trout on the Test and great salmon in Norway. In clear weather, with fine tackle and a small red worm, it will tax all the angler's skill to get the six dozen fish which the writer in the Times quotes as a fair basket. When the streams are fuller, on a grey day in June, large baskets may be made with the fly, and there is always the chance of a big fish, for the writer has seen trout of two pounds weight and over taken out of a small mountain burn. The trout extend to the uppermost waters, and where the stream is a narrow rivulet among heather far up on the mountain-side you will find well-grown fish, dark and strange-looking, but still shapely. The delights of such leisurely angling need not be dwelt on. It is a combina- tion of the joy of the explorer and the fisherman, and no man can know the secret beauties of a mountain stream who has not followed its fern-fringed pools till it became a trickle in the green moss of its birthplace. Even as things stand, then, there is much to be said for hill trout streams; but the writer in the Times is all for bettering them. Why, he asks, do not the fish run heavier ? There is ample feeding in the little glens, but what restricts the growth of the trout is that this feeding is not always available to them, and that they have too little room to move about in. In a spate there is water to spare for all ; but in normal summer veather the stream is reduced to a chain of deep pools connected by gleaming shallows where trout can barely move and cannot feed. But much of the aquatic fly lives in and about these shallows from which trout have departed, and a large quantity, therefore, of the natural food of the fish is wasted. The trout are huddled in the pools ; in a long drought they get woefully out of condition; and in any case, in such a place they offer few chances to the angler. The remedy proposed is to construct a number of little dams which shall deepen these shallows, and preserve some uniformity in the stream. The dams may be simply and cheaply constructed, for they have not to cope with any great weight of water. The stream would be allowed to run round rather than over them, so that the trout might have access to the upper reaches. There is much in the suggestion to commend it, and we believe that it would greatly improve. the fishing in those streams which never shrink below a' certain level, and in which there. is no very violent fall. For the mountain torrent nothing can be done, and little for those waters which are highly variable in their flow. A fortnight's steady drought in these latter will reduce the stream to a few pools linked by the slenderest trickle, and it is vain to hope by any damming to assist the fish. Within the last fortnight in parts of the West Highlands certain burns which contain good trout have almost disappeared out of existence. But in. more orderly waters, in the Scottish. Lowlands, for example, and in Northumberland, we believe that any proprietor who cared to take pains about his trout, and follow the advice of the Times writer, might produce' admirable results.
But hill streams may be said to, be neglected in another sense than the Times writer implies. In many parts of the Highlands, in deer forests and on grouse moors, there are excellent waters, well stocked with trout, which are never. fished. What fishing is done by lessee, or proprietor is for salmon in the river, and the brown trout are looked upon as little better than vermin. Once on a famous salmon river the present writer, passing the mouth of a large burn, asked if it contained trout. He was told by his gillie that it was full of them, many running to several pounds, but no one ever fished it. The nobler fish monopolised all the angling enthusiasm of the neighbourhood, What a man does with his waters is, of course, his own business ; but we Would point out to these fortunate people that they are Missing much real sport by neglecting such hill streams. Even if they are not inclined to fish them themselves, it seems a pity to interdict them to that large world of humble anglers who would travel any distance for the chance. There is, to be sure, the old difficulty of the other game, grouse and deer. In a deer forest for a part of the year seclusion is essential, but not for all the fishing months, and it is mere pedantry to pretend otherwise. The forests which show the greatest number of stags and the finest heads are not those which are preserved in a Trappist sacrosanctity. As for the grouse, apart from the actual days when the moor is being shot, we have never discovered what harm the infrequent angler can do to them. But if some hill streams are neglected because of over-preservation, many are neglected because they are too public. There are no finer natural trouting waters than those of the Scottish Lowlands in the upper dales of Tweed and Clyde and Annan. At one time great baskets were a certainty. The Ettrick Shepherd once in Megget filled a cart with trout the size of a herring, and Stewart in his "Practical Angler" wrote : "There are not many days from May till October in which an angler, thoroughly versed in all the mysteries of the craft, should not kill at least twelve pounds weight of trout in any county in the south of Scotland, not excepting Edinburglishire itself." Even in the recollection of young men streams which are now all but unfiehable were certain to give a good day. And the reason is simply that the new facilities of travel have flung them open to all and sundry. Artisans and miners come out in crowds on every holiday, and often, too, come in the evenings and fish during the night, not always by legitimate means. They return nothing, for they fish, naturally enough, for the pot, and the tiniest fingerling can be utilised. The result is that the waters are despoiled, and the trout remaining have become so wary that it is almost beyond the skill of the legitimate angler to circumvent them. Here is a clear case of neglected streams. We have no wish to see any men debarred from an innocent pleasure, but in the interests of that pleasure itself it would surely be wise to take measures in time to pre- vent its utter disappearance. Judicious preserving would save many noble fishing streams from barrenness, and would leave undiminished the chances of sport for those who are prepared to abide by its laws.
Previous page
