Fig. 75.—Brook Trout, Salvelinus fontinalis (Mitchill), natural size. (From life by Dr. R. W. Shufeldt.)
The American charr, or, as it is usually called, the brook-trout (Salvelinus fontinalis), although one of the most beautiful of fishes, is perhaps the least graceful of all the genuine charrs. It is technically distinguished by the somewhat heavy head and large mouth, the maxillary bone reaching more or less beyond the eye. There are no teeth on the hyoid bone, traces at least of such teeth being found in nearly all other species. Its color is somewhat different from that of the others, the red spots being large and the black more or less mottled and barred with darker olive. The dorsal and caudal fins are likewise barred or mottled, while in the other species they are generally uniform in color. The brook-trout is found only in streams east of the Mississippi and Saskatchewan. It occurs in all suitable streams of the Alleghany region and the Great Lake system, from the Chattahoochee River in northern Georgia northward at least to Labrador and Hudson Bay, the northern limits of its range being as yet not well ascertained. It varies greatly in size, according to its surroundings, those found in lakes being larger than those resident in small brooks. Those found farthest south, in the head-waters of the Chattahoochee, Savannah, Catawba, and French Broad, rarely pass the dimensions of fingerlings. The largest specimens are recorded from the sea along the Canadian coast. These frequently reach a weight of ten pounds; and from their marine and migratory habits, they have been regarded as forming a distinct variety (Salvelinus fontinalis immaculatus), but this form is merely a sea-run brook-trout. The largest fresh-water specimens rarely exceed seven pounds in weight. Some unusually large brook-trout have been taken in the Rangeley Lakes, the largest known to me having a reputed weight of eleven pounds. The brook-trout is the favorite game-fish of American waters, preëminent in wariness, in beauty, and in delicacy of flesh. It inhabits all clear and cold waters within its range, the large lakes and the smallest ponds, the tiniest brooks and the largest rivers; and when it can do so without soiling its aristocratic gills on the way, it descends to the sea and grows large and fat on the animals of the ocean. Although a bold biter it is a wary fish, and it often requires much skill to capture it. It can be caught, too, with artificial or natural flies, minnows, crickets, worms, grasshoppers, grubs, the spawn of other fish, or even the eyes or cut pieces of other trout. It spawns in the fall, from September to late in November. It begins to reproduce at the age of two years, then having a length of about six inches. In spring-time the trout delight in rapids and swiftly running water; and in the hot months of midsummer they resort to deep, cool, and shaded pools. Later, at the approach of the spawning season, they gather around the mouths of cool, gravelly brooks, whither they resort to make their beds.[[10]]
[10]. Hallock.
The trout are rapidly disappearing from our streams through the agency of the manufacturer and the summer boarder. In the words of an excellent angler, the late Myron W. Reed of Denver: "This is the last generation of trout-fishers. The children will not be able to find any. Already there are well-trodden paths by every stream in Maine, in New York, and in Michigan. I know of but one river in North America by the side of which you will find no paper collar or other evidence of civilization. It is the Nameless River. Not that trout will cease to be. They will be hatched by machinery and raised in ponds, and fattened on chopped liver, and grow flabby and lose their spots. The trout of the restaurant will not cease to be. He is no more like the trout of the wild river than the fat and songless reedbird is like the bobolink. Gross feeding and easy pond-life enervate and deprave him. The trout that the children will know only by legend is the gold-sprinkled, living arrow of the white water; able to zigzag up the cataract; able to loiter in the rapids; whose dainty meat is the glancing butterfly."
The brook-trout adapts itself readily to cultivation in artificial ponds. It has been successfully transported to Europe, and it is already abundant in certain streams in England, in California, and elsewhere.
In Dublin Pond, New Hampshire, is a gray variety without red spots, called Salvelinus agassizi.
Fig. 76.—Malma Trout, or "Dolly Varden," Salvelinus malma (Walbaum). Cook Inlet, Alaska.
The "Dolly Varden" trout, or malma (Salvelinus malma), is very similar to the brook-trout, closely resembling it in size, form, color, and habits. It is found always to the westward of the Rocky Mountains, in the streams of northern California, Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia, Alaska, and Kamchatka, as far as the Kurile Islands. It abounds in the sea in the northward, and specimens of ten to twelve pounds weight are not uncommon in Puget Sound and especially in Alaska. The Dolly Varden trout is, in general, slenderer and less compressed than the Eastern brook-trout. The red spots are found on the back of the fish as well as on the sides, and the back and upper fins are without the blackish marblings and blotches seen in Salvelinus fontinalis. In value as food, in beauty, and in gaminess Salvelinus malma is very similar to its Eastern cousin.
