M. Mark Miller, Author

Tag: fishing

  • A Tale: Lord Blackmore Riles His Guide by Catching 254 Fish in One Day — 1872

    In the 1870s a curious conflict developed  over who got to kill wildlife in Yellowstone Park. After decimating the bison herds on the great plains, hide hunters converged on the park and  slaughtering elk by the thousand leaving their carcasses to rot.

    Sport hunters condemned commercial hunting, but reserved their own right to blast away at anything that moved. On the other hand, hide hunters said they were just trying to make a living and condemned killing “just for fun.”

    The differing attitudes are illustrated  in the story below. It comes from the reminiscence of Jack Bean, an Indian fighter and commercial hunter who hired on as a guide to the Hayden Expedition of 1872.

    Lord William Blackmore, a wealthy Englishman who had helped fund the expedition, was Hayden’s guest and an avid fisherman. Here’s what Bean says happened when he went fishing with Lord Blackmore.

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    While the doctor was geologizing the country there, I went fishing with Sir William Blackmore in Lake Abundance.

    You could see plenty of trout close to shore in the lake, but when he got to catching them he thought it would be wonderful if he caught one for each year he was old—fifty four. He soon caught the fifty four and tried for a hundred, and was not long catching this and made a try for fifty-four more and kept fishing for another hundred, and another fifty-four.

    As we had gotten two thirds of the way around the lake by this time, I told him that I would quit as I had all the fish I could drag along on the grass, being two hundred and fifty-four. I dragged them into camp which was close along the lake and wanted to make a little show of these fish.

    Sir Blackmore, whenever he would see any bones would always ask, “How come those bones there?” I would tell him they were left by skin hunters in the winter.  He thought that all skin hunters should be put in jail for such vandalism and I told him he would do the same if he were in this country for the winter.

    So when I had shook all these fish off from the strings they made such a sight that I called Dr. Hayden’s attention to what Sir Blackmore would do if he had a chance. He colored up considerable and excused himself by saying, “The fish were so plenty it was Godsend to catch some of them out.”

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    In 1886 the U.S. Army took over administration of the Park and ended the holocaust by forbidding hunting for any purpose and regulating fishing.

    — For more stories about fishing in Yellowstone Park, click on “fishing” under the “Categories” button on the right.

    — Excerpt from Jack Bean’s Reminiscence, Pioneer Museum of Bozeman.

    — NPS llustration, Yellowstone Digital Slide.

    — You might enjoy Jack Bean’s sarcastic description of guiding a greenhorn in Colonel Pickett Gets His Bear.  It fun to compare Bean’s story with Colonel Pickett’s version.

    — You can read more of Bean’s delightful reminiscence in my book, Adventures in Yellowstone.

  • Paul Schullery Comments on the General’s Fishing Tackle

    My friend, Paul Schullery, who Trout magazine calls America’s “preeminent angling historian,”  was kind enough to offer a comment on my post of General W.E. Strong’s story, “The Rod Bent Nearly Double.” I thought it deserved to be featured as a guest article.

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    Strong’s accounts of the fishing that he and his companions enjoyed are interesting to historians for several reasons.

    The tackle is of interest because fashionable and well-heeled anglers of the mid-1870s were experiencing a revolution in their choice of gear, as the traditional (and often very large) solid-wood rods that had dominated the sport of fly fishing for centuries were being replaced by far lighter but often stiffer split-bamboo rods. Bamboo rods of this sort were expensive but very effective for distance- and precision-casting. Strong may have had some of those in his rod case, as it sounds like he had several rods.

    He was certainly in the majority in recognizing the importance of grasshoppers to the tastes of western trout. Though the British had been experimenting with some grasshopper imitations for centuries, the American grasshoppers were a considerably different and often much larger set of animals, and in the 1870s American anglers were just beginning to develop fly pattens that would work as well as the natural insects that Strong and his companions finally resorted to when their favorite artificial trout flies didn’t work. It would be several decades before American fly tiers developed floating grasshopper imitations that were consistent in catching fish when there were lots of natural grasshoppers competing for the trout’s attention.

    But Strong’s most interesting details may be about the trout itself.  No doubt his relatively light tackle, which included a silkworm gut leader that may not have been strong enough to horse a big fish in heavy water, had an effect on his handling of this fish. But by the mid-1900s, Yellowstone Cutthroat Trout would be widely regarded as the least sporting of the trout, in that they were typically thought of as the easiest to hook and the least strong as fighters. At least that was the prevailing stereotype; many of us have seen that same species of trout display great selectivity in feeding, and great strength in resisting capture once hooked. But for a Yellowstone Cutthroat Trout to jump clear of the water, repeatedly, would seem like an oddity to most modern anglers; at least I rarely have seen it or heard of it, and any number of respected authorities have said that they don’t jump. For whatever combination of evolutionary reasons, the species stereotypically does not feature jumping among its usual escape  tactics. But there are exceptions to every rule; I’ve heard or read that brown trout don’t jump, either, but I’ve seen them do so many times. What Strong’s account gives us is lots to think about as far as how well we know these fish; he tells us to be careful about our generalizations.

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    — For more stories about fishing in Yellowstone Park, click on “fishing” under the “Categories” button on the right.

  • A Tale: “The Rod Bent Nearly Double,” General W. E. Strong — 1875

    One of the most luxurious early trips to Yellowstone Park was led by President U.S. Grant’s Secretary of War, General William Belknap. In 1875, Belknap was joined by four other Generals including W.E. Strong, who provide an account of the trip.

    The Generals crossed the country in a plush Pullman car smoking cigars, drinking whisky, and telling stories, on the new transcontinental railroad. Then they rode in a special stagecoach that traveled at breakneck speed from Utah to Montana.

    Along the way they were feted with banquets, parties and parades. In Bozeman a Silver Coronet Band greeted them at the edge of town and escorted them through the city to Fort Ellis.

    At Fort Ellis they were provided with an escort of active duty soldiers led by Gustavus Doane, who had commanded the escort of the Washburn Expedition in 1870.

    Each General was assigned an orderly to take care of his every whim: packing his personal belongings, putting up his tent, rolling out his bed roll, digging his latrine, and cleaning any fish he caught. All at army expense, of course. A year later the U.S. Senate impeached General Belknap for taking bribes.

    General Strong eloquently describes the wonders of Yellowstone—falls, hot springs and geysers, and describes the people he met—mountain men, stagecoach drivers, and towns people. Most of all, he revels in telling exciting tales of hunting elk, stampeding buffalo, and catching fish. Here’s his description of fishing.

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    Again I threw my hook in the swift water, and down the stream it went like lightning, tossing about like a feather in the rapid. My reel whirled and spun like a buzz saw, the line went out so fast.

    I never touched the reel to check the running line till seventy-five feet, at least, was in the water. Then I pressed my thumb firmly upon it and drew gently back the rod. At the same instant something struck my hook that nearly carried me off my feet. I had to let go the reel to save the rod.

    I had him securely hooked, but could I land him? That was the question. I gave him twenty-five or thirty feet more line—then checked again and tried to hold him—but it was no use, the rod bent nearly double, and I had to let him run.

    My line was one hundred and fifty feet in length, and I knew when it was all out, if the fish kept in the rapids, I should lose him. No tackle like mine could stand for a moment against the strength of such a fish as I had struck in such swift water.

    I therefore continued to give him the line—but no faster than I was forced to.   No more than twelve or fifteen feet remained on the reel. Fortunately for me, he turned to the left and was carried into an eddy which swept him into more quiet water near the shore.

    Twice in his straight run down the rapid current of the stream he leaped clear from the water. I saw he was immense—something double or triple the size of any trout I had ever caught. The excitement to me was greater than anything I had ever experienced.

    No one but a trout fisherman can understand or appreciate the intense pleasure of a single run. I was crazy to kill and land him, and yet I knew the chances were against it. Again and Again I reeled him within twenty-five or thirty feet of the rock. But he was game to the last, and would dart off with the same strength as when he first struck. I had to let him go.

    Finally, he showed signs of exhaustion. I managed to get him to top the water, and then worked him in close to the sore. Flynn was waiting to take the line and throw him out, as I had no landing net. Flynn did it very well. When the trout was very near the bank and quiet, he lifted him out.

    He was a fine specimen, and would weigh four pounds if he weighed an ounce.   This trout was three times the size I had ever caught. At 4:30 o’clock I stopped fishing having landed thirty-five trout which would have run from two and a half to four pounds in weight—none less than two and one half pounds.

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    — See Paul Schulery’s comments on General Strong’s fishing tackle.

    — For more stories about fishing in Yellowstone Park, click on “fishing” under the “Categories” button on the right.

    — From W.E. Strong, A Trip to the Yellowstone National Park in July, August, and September, 1875.

    — Photo from Paul Schullery, Yellowstone Digital Slide File.

  • A Tale: Cooking Fish on the Hook in a Hot Spring

    Many Yellowstone Park tourists describe places where an angler can catch a fish and cook it in a nearby hot spring without taking it off the hook, but few report actually doing it. Henry J. Winser described performing the feat in his 1883 guide for tourists.

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    It has often been said that it possible to catch trout in the Yellowstone Lake and cook them in a boiling spring close behind the angler—without taking them off the hook. The assertion seems incredible and it is generally doubted. This extraordinary feat may certainly be accomplished, not only at the Yellowstone Lake, but also on the Gardiner River below the Mammoth Hot Springs. The writer performed it at the latter place, and in the presence of nine witnesses.

    Selecting a likely pool of the ice-cold stream with a boiling spring fifteen feet distant from the bank, he stood upon a projecting rock and made a cast. His flies soon tempted a trout to his doom. The fish was small enough to be lifted out of the water without the aid of a landing net, and it was quite easy to drop him into the bubbling hot spring behind. His life must have been extinguished instantly.

    This procedure was repeated several times, and each of the spectators who had purposely assembled to test the truth of the strange assertion, partook of the fish thus caught and boiled. It required from three to five minutes to thoroughly cook the victims of the experiment, and it was the general verdict that they only needed a little salt to make them quite palatable.

    This is a “fish story,” without doubt, but a perfectly true one. A feat so extraordinary could nowhere else be practiced.

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    — For more stories about fishing in Yellowstone Park, click on “fishing” under the “Categories” button on the right.

    — Excerpt from Henry J. Winser,  The Yellowstone National Park: A Manual for tourists. New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1883. (Pages 39-40).

    —Frank J. Haynes Postcard, Yellowstone Slide File.