The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1894-10-17
a REGULAR FIGHTER.
The Mackinaw Trout Tests the Fisher.
mans Line and Skill.

If the Mackinaw trout could be
fshed for with a light rod and tackle,
as salmon are, said a New Yorker who
has been trying those game Lake
Michigan fish, the title of the salmon
as king of game fish would fall at
once. The Mackinaw trout is stronger
than the salmon, of greater average
weight, equally as tactful, and as fierce
a fighter as that Goliath of fresh
water fish the muskallonge. A bout
with one of these trout at the end of
hundred feet of line on supple split
bamboo rod would give the sturdiest
salmon fisherman enough of hard and
exciting work to satisfy him for the
day. Eighteen, twenty, and even
twenty-five Founders are by no means
uncommon, and thirty-pounders excite
no more than ordinary comment.
But the Mackinaw trout. like the
salmon trout of the New York lakes,
isn't built for fine tackle, and if you
want him you must work the oars of a
boat faithfully and trail your whirling
troll at the end of two or three hundred
feet of heavy line in from fifty to one
hundred feet of water. Sometimes the
fishermen ties his line to his leg as he
rows his boat, but the usual style is to
hold it in his moEth-that is, if he is
FISH, ing for trout anywhere on the lake
but Traverse bay.
From time out of mind Mackinaw
trout have been fshed for in Lake
Michigan with a slender, minnow-
shs ped troll. so made that it viii whirl
ra Eddy when drawn through the wa
ter. and fastened to a staring white
linz as big around es a lead pencil.
A good many fishermen had held for
years that this trolling line was
detriment to fishing, as il acted as
menace to the trout, which are shy and
wary, and that with line less in evil
dence in the clear waters of the lake
greater success would attend the sue
cess of Mackinaw trout fishing. But
no one seemed courageous enough to
try any other kind of line until two
years ago, when a citizen of Traverse
City, who was not a fisherman, made
up his mind that he knew how more
and bigger trout could be caught, and
he went fishing one day with
fine copper wire for his line in
stead of the staring white Irvine
Of the fathers. This wire was
absolutely invisible in the water
anG when let out with the troll carried
watchful eye. The result was that this
citizen came ashore with boat-load of
the biggest Mackinaw trout anyone
had ever seen in one lot from Traverse
bay. Since then the fishermen in that
part have adopted the copper wire for
trolling line, but elsewhere on the
lake the hide-bound old sportsmen stick
to tradition and white Irvine.
There is no MISLEADING the strike of
Mackinaw trout on the troll, and the
instant he makes it all other
business must be subordinated to
that of getting him safe into the
boat In the expressive and compre-
hensive parlance of the Lake Michigan
fisherman, you've get to keep a Mack
inaw trout agoin'. It's no easy matter
10 keep fifteen CT twenty-pound
Mackinaw trout agoin', and the mex
perienced angler will find that the first
'l1eepin' him a-goin'.' If the big fish
get; the least bit OF slack line, he Will
turQ and dash away, sometimes actual
" pulling the boat around, if not tow
ing it. Once headed away from the
fisherman, this game and lusty fish
rarely fails to break the hold of the
hook. The angler who can keep his
trolt a-goin' as he hauls in the line
hard over hand, nay get his prize
alongside or within spearing or shoot
ing distance in the course of fifteen or
twenty minutes.
1.-The Mackinaw trout fishermen
never take the risk even of gaffing a
big trout. Indeed, some carry revol
vers of large calibe-, and when the
troIt is hauled alongside the boat or
within safe range they shoot it in the
head, and put the fight beyond all
question. Others spear their catches
with. long handled, Sharp-tined gigs
STOPPED The BABY'S CRY.