THE STRIPED BASS. (Labrax Lineatus. Cuvier.)

ROCK FISH. Southern States and Delaware River.—BARRE FISH. St. Lawrence.

This noble fish, a member of a tribe known in almost every region of the globe, is, as an individual, peculiar to the waters of North America, not being found in any other part of the world; while his geographical range here, being very extensive, covers most if not all the rivers, bays, lagoons and beaches from the Capes of Florida to the Estuary of the St. Lawrence; in which great frith he is found, slightly modified from the Atlantic type, and known as the Barre Fish.

He must not be confounded with the Sea Bass, as he has been by Dr. Smith, the author of the Fishes of Massachusetts, who takes Dr. Mitchell severely to task for naming him Bodianus Mitchilli; accusing the Doctor of extreme arrogance and presumption in assuming the discovery and right of naming a fish, which he—Smith—alledges to be known to every fisherman and naturalist of every European coast; whereas, in reality, the fact is precisely as stated by Dr. Mitchell.

The Striped Bass is a very beautiful fish, of the order Acanthopterygii, or thorny finned fishes, and of the family Pereidæ; which may be distinguished from the soft finned tribes, by having the whole of the first dorsal fin supported by strong, sharp, spinous rays, by a single strong spine in front of the second dorsal, one in front of the ventrals, and three in front of the anal fin. The operculum, or gill-cover, has a serrated edge and two flat spines. Its dental system is very complete and formidable, on the maxillaries, palatine-bones, and tongue, as it is essentially a carnivorous fish, preying indiscriminately on most of the smaller finny inhabitants of the waters, as also on their spawn, and on some of the smaller crustaceæ, as crabs and shrimps.

In color he is bright and silvery, bluish brown, with copperish reflections on the back, and eight, or sometimes though rarely nine, parallel stripes of dark brownish purple—the fourth of these is ordinarily consentaneous with the lateral line, though sometimes the fifth. Those above it run from the head to the origin of the tail, and are by far the darkest; those below are fainter, and die away at about two-thirds the length of the belly.

The pectoral fins have sixteen rays, the ventrals one spinous and five soft rays, the anal three spinous and eleven soft rays, the first dorsal nine spinous, the second one spinous and twelve soft, the caudal seventeen soft rays.

The Sea Bass, which is of the same order and family, Pereidæ, is purely a sea fish, never entering estuaries or rivers, and never being taken in other than salt waters, on the outer bars and sea-banks, whereas the Striped Bass, like the Salmon, though salt water is necessary to him, in order to give vigor to his constitution, and perhaps to enable him to reproduce his species, is taken without distinction in the clear cold spring-waters of the river-heads, in the brackish slack-waters of the broad estuaries, in the strong, whirling salt eddies of sea-channels, such as Hellgate, and the inlets from the ocean to the inner bays, and lastly in the tumbling and flashing surfs on all the outer beaches, from those, I believe, of Hatterns, alone all the coasts north-eastward to those of Jersey and Long Island; on which they are taken with the squid and the seine from July to November, of rare excellence, and in great abundance.

The river runs of the Striped Bass are very singular, and though I will not say unaccountable—by no means accounted for. So soon as the Smelt, Shad, and Herring enter the river-mouths and estuaries, the Striped Bass is found following them; and in every different water it appears that he acts on a peculiar and instinctive principle. Where, when, or how he spawns no man knows or has written.

Our rivers he enters from the Delaware eastward from the first of March and later as the season offers, and makes up to the clear, cool spring-waters of the rivers near their heads. At that time he may be fished for, in the Delaware and in all the rivers in which the Shad run up and spawn, with shad-roe FATALLY.

In waters up which the Shad does not run this bait is useless.

Thus, for instance, at Macomb’s Dam, Kingsbridge, and all the Harlæm River and Hellgate, in the neighborhood of New York, shad-roe is useless; because the Shad do not spawn there, and the Bass know it. While in the Passaic, at Belleville Bridge and Acquanonck, up to both which places these fish run, there is a certainty of taking them with this bait, because Shad do spawn in the Passaic.

Therefore, in all rivers up which Shad run, the true and best bait for the Striped Bass is the shad-roe.

This must be prepared thus. The roe of the female fish—that is the hard roe—must be taken, cleaned, washed, and washed again, and then potted down with two ounces of salt to every half pound of roe, pressed close into a stone pot and hermetically sealed. After three months it will be fit for use; when it must be cut out of the pot like cheese, fastened on the hook in a small lump, and tied to it by a lapping of light-colored floss silk, or raveled hemp.

At this same time, in tideways such as Hellgate and the like, crab is the best and most killing bait on a line by rod and reel fishing, with weight enough to keep your crab within three inches of the bottom; thus you shall take abundance of moderate sized fishes—the best by all odds on the table—but if you aim at the thirty and forty pounders, you must take that hideous and disgusting fishy reptile, the real squid, armed with a strong cod-hook, on a heavy hempen line, trolled from the stern of a boat slowly pulled against stream.

The Bass will strike at a gaudy fly, or a spun minnow, at the latter every where, at the first seldom, and I believe casually; though if you do hook him look out, for he shall try your line, and strain your tackle to the utmost, and if you land even a three pounder on a single gut with fly or minnow trolled, you have done great work.

The favorite haunts of the Striped Bass, whence his provincial name of Rock Fish, are stony, gravelly, or rocky reefs, or sunken piers and dams which cause eddies, in the vicinity of which his prey are to be found darting about in the greatest abundance, and in such localities he is often taken with the rod and reel in great numbers, running from two and a half to seven pounds in weight, which is the best size for the table.

The Bass is a bold and fierce biter; and when he takes the bait he does it with a will, and there is no occasion for giving him line or time wherein to pouch the bait before striking, as you must do with the European Pike, and the American Pickerel and Mascalonge.

In the Harlæm river he is fished for with a stout rod and reel, a strong line of at least three hundred feet, and crab or shrimp bait, or sometimes a shiner or spearling hooked through the back-fin with a large-sized Limerick hook armed upon gimp. A sinker is used in this mode of fishing, and the bait should be suspended at some distance from the bottom, and allowed to swim about at his own sweet will.

When struck the Bass does not leap out of water, like the trout or salmon, but he is decidedly a run-away fish, taking twice as much line—pound weight for yard length—as the Salmon, and, though not so fierce or furious, requiring as much skill to handle. You must give him your line inch by inch, as sparingly as possible, heading him down stream if you can, and wearing him out always by concession and persuasion.

So much for him in the spring. How far he goes up the rivers in his spring run, we know not, nor presume to say. Killed he has been in October at Milford, Delaware, prime, and in good condition, but I think not running up to spawn himself, but rather to eat the roe of the shad which do run thitherward up to spawn.

After July and from thence to September they disappear from among us of the rivers, and during that period they are taken constantly by squidding, as it is called, that is to say, by using a large sized Limerick-hook, shanked with a piece of bright tin, mother-of-pearl, or ivory, attached to a long cod-line wound upon a card, in the rapid swirling eddies among rocks in the great outer tideways, and yet more readily in the wild, thundering surfs of the outside beaches. I have seen them taken thus off Shrewsbury Inlet, near Sandy-Hook, to the weight of sixty or seventy pounds; but it is a laborious, wet, and dirty toil, and cannot in anywise be regarded as a sport.

The line, without a rod, is whirled round the head, and the squid delivered, without a splash in the water, if it so may be, and then dragged in hand over hand, the fish striking with his whole power, and being mastered by main force.

Late in the autumn the Bass run in again, for what purpose we know not, save this, that the growth and comparative size of the fry as taken not justifying our believing that they breed in fresh rivers—we must consider them to be in pursuit of prey.

In the Delaware they are trolled for gnostically and rightfully, with a minnow, shiner, or young shad, baited on a double hook, armed on a treble gut with two swivels, a trolling-rod, and good Conroy’s reel—this is the true and scientific way of doing it.

The best rod for this sport is the regular trolling, or, as it is otherwise called, barbed rod. It should be twelve feet long, the butt of stout ash, the second and third joints of hickory, and the fourth of lance-wood. It should by no means have rings, but the new patent rail-road guides, five in number, exclusive of the funnel guide at the tip. It is a very good plan to have a double set of guides, on the opposite sides of the rod, for the stress is so great in this kind of fishing that in time the best rods will acquire a curvature, and lose their elasticity. This is easily counteracted by changing the line from side to side, and thus reversing the action.

The best trolling-rods are made by George Karr, of Grand Street, and Ben Welch, of Cherry St., New York.

The reel should be a simple one, large enough to contain one hundred yards of line.

This truly sporting mode of killing the Striped Bass is not used in New York, where, in fact, there are few fishermen, except fly fishermen—some very good, although, like angel visits—or pot fishermen.

There the crab and the shrimp, with a dobber, as the pot fishermen call it, is the weapon, and the best wielder of it is he who brings the most and heaviest fish to pot, with the most violence and the least skill.

The autumn being past, the Striped Bass retires for the winter to the mud-holes, which he loves, the soft, warm coves at the mouths of rivers and estuaries, wherein he lurks requiescent until spring again calls his prey into the rivers, and himself out of his lurking-places.

These be his times, his seasons, his baits, and his places; as to his local habitation, and the place where he deposits and brings up his children, nobody distinctly knowing, we shall be exceeding glad to receive facts whereon to constitute something approaching to that which is unwritten—the complete natural history of the Bass.