Trout Music
By Ed Zern
I met a man on the Bushkill one time who was carrying a portable
radio. He said it was the only way he could catch the Sunday afternoon
symphony concerts and still be out on a trout stream. He'd tune in a good
concert, turn up the volume and set the radio on a rock beside a good
pool. By intermission time he'd have worked that pool pretty thoroughly,
and during the commercial he'd move on to the next one.
He said the music had a definite effect on the trout, despite theories that
fish can't hear sounds in the air. He claimed that trout rose like crazy to
Mozart, Haydn, and Vivaldi, became nervous and irritable during a
Brahms program, rising short if at all. Any Wagner composition would
send them straight to the bottom, there they'd sulk - although a Beethoven
quartet would bring them up again.
He said he personally admired the work of Shostakovich, but that brown
trout were apparently conservative, and drew the line at Prokofieff. Also,
that one of the best days he'd ever had was completely ruined in the
midst of a terrific green drake hatch, when he accidently tuned in a singing
commercial and put down every trout for miles around. ~ Ed Zern
Credits: From To Hell with Fishing, by Ed Zern,
Published by Appleton-Century, 1945.
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