BROWN TROUT IN VICTORIA LAKE

Press, Volume LXXII, Issue 21808, 13 June 1936, Page 8

BROWN TROUT IN VICTORIA LAKE

PRESENCE EXPLAINED BY LETTER The discovery of a large brown trout by members o’f the lakes committee of the North Canterbury Acclimatisation Society when they explored Victoria Lake after it had been drained and found that the 10,000 rainbow trout fry which had been liberated some Seasons ago had disappeared has been explained by a letter to the secretary of the society, Mr C. W. Hervey. The writer, who signs himself “Dry Fly Fiend,” states that he and a friend were fishing in the Avon at the back of Christ’s College last season and landed a slab river brown trout. “Although of quite large size, it was in such poor condition that we thought it was not worth taking home,” the letter continues. “While it was still feebly kicking on the riverbank an idea came to us that it would be a good idea to transport it to the lake, where the feed may have been more plentiful than in the Avon. “The fish was duly transferred, and so were two others we caught that evening, but what has become of the other two? That is what we want to know. They were very much smaller than the first so perhaps were caught by small boys with pins. “Sorry we are not able to throw any light on the missing 10,000 fry and/or the liberation of carp and goldfish.” In a later inspection of the lake bed two rainbow trout, one 18 inches long and the other 16f inches were discovered. Professor E. Percival, a member of the committee who made the inspection, said last evening that the society was anxious to know whether these fish were the two mentioned by the correspondent in addition to the brown trout. If they’ were it meant that the fry liberated by the society had entirely disappeared. No further explanation had been discovered, for the presence of the carp and goldfish which had also been found in the lake.