hould be adopted in the case of salmon and sea-trout as
far as is possible, and if this is done a very large percentage of the
ova should be successfully reared to the smolt stage.

CHAPTER XIII

COARSE FISH

Compared to what is known about the early part of the life history of
the _Salmonidae_, our knowledge of coarse fish is small. Fortunately,
however, such lengthy and complicated proceedings as are necessary to
obtain a good stock of trout are not necessary to obtain a good stock of
coarse fish. If even a few rudd, perch, dace, pike, or carp are put into
water where they have a good supply of food to begin with, and which is
suitable otherwise for their well-being, the amateur's chief trouble
after a few years, if the water is not heavily fished, will be to keep
down the stock of coarse fish in proportion to the supply of food.

I have seen many cases where rudd, perch, dace and carp have increased
to an enormous extent from a few fish introduced into the water. Some
four years ago we put a few small rudd into a mill-pond at home,
thinking that the fry they produced would serve admirably as food to the
trout which also inhabited the pond. In about twenty months the pond was
full of small rudd, and last year we netted out many hundred, as the
water was terribly over-stocked with them. The same thing has happened
in almost every case which has come to my knowledge; that is, of course,
where the waters have been stocked with food, and suitable to the fish
introduced.

The way in which dace will increase when put into a suitable water is,
if possible, even more remarkable than what happens in the case of the
rudd. I will quote one instance, which proves this very conclusively. A
few years ago there were no dace in the Sussex Ouse. Pike fishermen,
however, used to bring live dace to use as baits. Some of these escaped,
or were set free by the fishermen at the end of their day's fishing, and
now the Sussex Ouse contains more dace for its size than any other river
I have ever seen.

While rudd thrive best in a pond or lake into which a stream flows, dace
require a river or stream to do well. They will, however, thrive and
increase rapidly in a river where trout are not a success. A muddy
bottom with occasional quickly running shallows, seem to constitute the
best kind of water for dace. The largest, and by far the best
conditioned dace I have seen, have come from the tidal parts of rivers,
where the water is