Caddis or Cad-bait, s. A kind of worm or grub.
The several kinds of cadews in their nympha, or maggot state, thus house themselves; one sort in straw, called from thence straw-worms; others in two or more parallel sticks, creeping at the bottom of brooks; a third, in a small bundle of pieces of rushes, duckweed, &c. glued together, therewith they float on the surface, and can row themselves about the water with the help of their feet; both these are called cad-bait. It is a curious faculty that these creatures possess, of gathering such bodies as are fittest for their purpose, and then so gluing them together, some to be heavier than water, that the animal may remain at bottom where its food is, and others to be so buoyant as to float, and there collect its sustenance; these houses are coarse, and show no outward art, but are within well tunnelled and have a tough hard paste, into which the hinder part of the maggot is so fixed, that its cell can be drawn after it without danger of leaving it behind, and it can also thrust out its body to reach the needful supplies, or withdraw into its covering for protection and safety.
These insects inhabit pits, ponds, low running rivers, or ditches, in cases of different forms, and composed of various materials; some of them inclosed in a very rough shell, found among weeds in standing waters, are generally tinged green; others are bigger than a gentle, and of a yellowish hue, with a black head; they are an excellent bait, and are found in most plenty in gravelly and stony rivulets, and by the sides of streams, in large rivers among stones.
To collect them, turn up the stones, and the best will adhere to them; when the quantity wanted is obtained, put them into a linen bag for five or six days, dip them, together with the bag, into water once a day, and hang them up; they will then turn yellow, become tough, and fitter for angling than when first got from the brook. If meant to be kept long, they must be put into a thick woollen bag, with some of the moist gravel or sand from the same rivulet whence they are taken; they must be wetted twice a day, but oftener in very hot weather; when you carry them abroad, fill the bag with water and holding the mouth of it close, let the water run from them; thus they have been kept three weeks. Another way of preserving them is, by placing them in an earthen pot full of river water, with some of the gravel they were bred in at the bottom; but the preceding method is preferable: some use bait pans of different sizes for insects, the tops punched full of holes, not so large as to admit of their escaping when placed in the river, which not only keeps them cool, but supplies them with aliment in the fresh water; some keep them in moss in a woollen bag on a damp floor, taking care that the bag retains a proper moisture. Another mode of preserving caddis, and also grasshoppers, caterpillars, oak-worms, or natural flies, is to take the green withy bark from a bough six or seven inches round, and about a foot in length, turn both ends into the form of a hoop, and fasten them with a large needle and thread; stop up the bottom with cork, and bore the bark full of holes with a red hot wire, tie over it a colewort leaf, and lay it in the grass every night: in this manner caddis may be preserved until they turn to flies. When grasshoppers are to be preserved in the case, some grass must be put into it.
In angling with caddis, the line, when all out, should be as long as the rod, for three lengths next the hook, of single hairs, with the smallest float, and the least weight of lead, that the swiftness of the stream will allow to sink, and that may be aided by avoiding the violence of the current, and angling in the returns of a stream, or in the eddies betwixt two; which are also the most likely places wherein to kill fish, either at the top or bottom. The caddis may be at times, with very good effect, joined to a worm, and sometimes to an artificial fly, to cover the point of the hook, and also two or three together may be put upon the hook; but it is always to be angled with at the bottom, especially when by itself, with the finest tackle, and at all seasons is a most holding bait for trout and grayling.—Daniel.
Cag, s. A barrel or wooden vessel, made to contain four or five gallons.
Cage, s. An enclosure of twigs or wire, in which birds are kept; a place for wild beasts; a prison for petty malefactors.
In Falconry, the cage is an oblong frame, four feet six inches long and two feet wide, made of light wood, the sides and ends are of a proper size for hawks to perch upon, and a little wadded, that it may not injure their feet. It is supported, when placed on the ground, by four legs, about a foot long. Slight rods of hazel are fixed across each end, to prevent the hawks from falling on the inside when they bait. A space of about twenty inches in length is left in the middle of the cage, in which the falconer places himself, carrying it by two straps that pass over his shoulders. The hawks are tied upon the cage as upon a perch, and by this contrivance many may be carried by one man.
Cages and other instruments used in falconry, are well described in the plates of the French Encyclopædia, printed in 1751.—Sebright.
Cage, v. To enclose in a cage.