Spawning Season

The salmon family of the Atlantic States, including the eastern salmon, the salmon trout, the brook trout, the whitefish, and the lake herring, spawns in the autumn and fore part of winter. The grayling spawns in March and April, the California salmon in summer, commencingin the latter part of August, and the California mountain trout in Spring, beginning in the middle of March. Trout commence to spawn about October. The colder the climate is, the earlier they will spawn. In Caledonia Creek the trout lay their first eggs about the 12th of October; the water standing then at about forty-eight degrees. In the preserves where the temperature, at that time, is a few degrees higher, they begin to spawn about the 1st of November, and cease about the 1st of March. The length of the spawning season depends upon the equality of the temperature of the water. In streams where the temperature does not vary much, winter or summer, the length of the season is three or four months, sometimes more, and in cold mountain streams it only lasts two months, closing by the middle of January.

Signs Of Spawning

As the season of spawning ap proaches, the difference of sexes shows more clearly. It is very hard in the summer to tell the difference between a male and female trout. By handling them much and watching them closely the trout breeder comes to know the male and female apart almost instinctively; but he would be puzzled to tell just how he knows it. The male is generally sharper jawed than the female at any season of the year, and lines drawn from his shoulders to his tail would be straight without any bulge in the middle, while the female has a rounder jaw, and even in summer is more protuberant in the middle. These are general signs, and by no means universal. It is only in the spawning season that difference of the sexes can be told with any certainty. As this season approaches the distinctions become more marked. The difference in size is one peculiarity, as the eggs grow large and fill the belly of the female. It will not do to mistake food for eggs. A trout recently gorged with food looks just like a female full of eggs ; but the food soon disappears, as a trout is an animal of quick digestion, while the swelling caused by the maturing eggs gets larger as the spawning season approaches. The colors of the fish, also, are at that time a guide. The female turns to a dark and sombre hue, while the colors of the males grow very brilliant, a line of brilliant scarlet red often developing itself along his sides on the edge of the belly.

Natural Spawning

As the spawning season approaches, the trout seek places in the creek adapted to the purpose. These places have a pebbly bottom in shallow water close to the spring or head waters of the creek. Trout will work their way up over the shallows of a stream clear to the source; but if there are springs in the bottom which is the case with almost all creeks they will invariably spawn there, without going up farther, or if they find a shallow place with gentle current and gravel bottom anywhere in the creek, they will use it. Very few of the eggs laid in such a place will come to maturity unless there happens to be a spring. The males sometimes go up the stream first. At this season the males engage in fierce contests for the possession of the females.

These battles often end in death to one or both of the combatants. That these battles are fierce, the deep wounds left on the dead bodies of the slain will bear witness. They have been known to fight for two days, and then both be killed. However, when they are once mated the battles cease and the pair are hardly ever seriously interfered with. Intruders in any quantity come around, seemingly out of curiosity ; but, no matter what their size, they leave as soon as the husband, for the time being, darts at them. These intruders are, perhaps, waiting for a chance to devour some of the stray eggs which the female drops. The male and female being paired, go to the chosen place. They lie side by side together when not disturbed; but the male is occupied most of the time in driving off interlopers. It is very curious to see a little male with a big female in charge. Usually the little trout clears the way for the large one without a show of resistance. In the ponds when the trout are fed the largest get the meat while the little ones get out of the way, and swim to the further side of the pond, and even if the meat is thrown where they are they will not take it until they have waited to see whether it is not the pleasure of the big fellows to claim it. At the spawning season all this is changed, they will attack a trout three times their size if he comes within less than a respectful distance of the female. Often while the male is driving off one, another on the opposite side will make tender advances; quick as a dart the proper husband returns to chase the gay deceiver. In fact his time is fully occupied with chasing off intruders. If they are too numerous the female will dart from the nest over which she hovers, to help her chosen mate. A nest is made in the gravel by the female. It is simply a shallow hole about six or eight inches in diameter and about two or three inches deep. This is made by diving down at intervals against the gravel and as she comes up giving it a slirt to one side with her tail. Nearly the same motion as may be often observed when trout dart down to the bottom and rub their sides against it to free themselves from parasites. The dipping motion is continued for some days until the nest is large enough to suit her. After lying over this some time the female is ready to emit a portion of her eggs. The male lies by her side while she does so. However busy he may have been in driving off interlopers, he seems to know by instinct when the female is ready to emit her eggs and is always by he side. At the time she emits her eggs he emits his milt over them. They do this with a curious curl upward, which every trout-breeder should see for himself. Very often the male and female lock jaws together and their heads slowly rise, apparently trembling with excitement. They emit eggs and milt until a nearly vertical position is gained, still lying over the hole, then, they fall away from one another and the male retires to some secluded spot where he remains live or ten minutes resting. This interval the female employs in covering her eggs. She will flirt in with her tail all the stones of proper size to be found near her nest, and if there are not enough to cover it to her liking she will go above, and, picking out a particular stone, work it down backward between the two ventral fins. This labor she continues until the eggs are completely covered.