ANGLING.

Otago Witness, Issue 1905, 25 May 1888, Page 28

ANGLING.

BY JOCK SCOTT.

To ie a perfect fisherman you require more excellences than are usually to be found in such a small space as is allotted to a man's carcass. — Parker Oilmore. {Headers are invited to contribute items of local fishing news for insertion in this column. For insertion in the ensuing issue they should reach Dunedin by Monday night's mail.] Fishing in Japan. Carter Harrison, in a letter to the Chicago Mail, writes as follows about fishing in Japan : — The farmers seem to be also fishermen. This is a vast business on tbe Yang-tse. For 1000 miles a huge dip net is to be seen every 100 yds or so on either bank. This is from 20ft to 30ft square, is attached to long poles inserted in the banks, and lifted by pulleys. It seemed to me that the fisherman invariably lifted his net as we passed, intending probably to have it up before the steamer's swell should drive the fish out. A large fish caught is taken out by a small scoop net. The smaller ones drop through a throat in the centre of a net into a bag, where they remain until the fisherman is ready to go home. Thousands of fishing boats are always to be seen, and in swarms early in the morning and late in the evening. Some with dip nets ingeniously rigged out at the stern and also lifted by the pulley ; others with drag nets. This muddy river is full of fish, some of them of great size and in great variety. In the spring vast quantities of samlai, a species of shad, are caught. They are said to be very fine. I have myself seen many varieties of fish, some very beautiful in form, and have eaten several kinds which are equal to any fresh water fish I know. As with the Japanese, fish seems to be the flesh food of the average Chinese. Pork is his delight, but fish his piece de resistance. It is everywhere to be seen for sale, and is carried dried in great quantities to the far interior. It is very cheap, the very best costing only 2c or 3c per lb. Many singular modes of catching fish are practised. Boys and men dive down from the piers in the cities and bring up good-sized ones. I suppose they catch them in their hiding places. But still more amusing to me is to see a boat go out with a bamboo pole aoross its bow, with a dozen or so trained cormorants perched upon it. Reaching the fishing grounds a cord is tied about the bird's neck and he is sent down to fish. He rarely fails to bring one up. He cannot swallow it on account of the cord on his " guzzle," so he brings it to his master, who rewards the bird with a small fish and sends down another. And so en till he fills his boat. I was told that some of the birds are so trained that they do uot have to be throttled. This mode of fishing is used more on the small lakes made when the river falls, than in the river itself. Vast numbers of lakes are left when the floods go down, and these, a man told me, are simply alive with the finny tribe. The Fishing Maiden. She was full of cunning crinkles, little tricks and wily wrinkles to catch crabs and periwinkles in the waters of the bay. She knew all the leading jobbers in fish tackle, reels, and bobbers, and she always caught the robbers that would steal her bait away. She could see without her glasses how to catch her trout and basses, and she gathered in by masses victims of her wily skill. Only one thing was the matter— she could flsh but couldn't flatter ; and that made the young men scatter— she could never fill tho bill. — " Seneca," in Eahway Advocate. Scales. The fishes commonly called "surgeons" are readily recognised by the sharp lancet-shaped spine with which each side of the tail is armed. When at rest the spine is hidden in a sheath ; but it can be erected and used by the fish as a very dangerous weapon, by striking with the tail towards the right and left. " Surgeons " occur in all tropical seas, with exception of the eastern part of the Pacific, where they disappear with the corals. They do not attain to any great size, the largest rarely exceeding 18in in length. Many species are showily coloured and some are esteemed as food.

The fishes known as " sea-bats" are so called, says Gunther, from the extraordinary length of some portions of thdr ilor.-al and anal fins and of their ventrals. These loug lobes are generally of a deep black colour. There are probably not more than seven species, and they all belong to the Indian Ocean and Western Pacific, where they are common.

The " dory " of the family Cytfcidse, according to Gunther's nomenclature (not to be confounded with our " dory " or wall-eyed pike), is a truly marine species, and inhabit the temperate zone of the Northern and Southern Hemispheres. *'John Dorys" are found in the Mediterranean, on the eastern temperate shores of the Atlantic, and on the coasts of Japan and Australia.