A long and slender spoon used by G.E.M. Skues of Britain to examine the stomach content of a trout.　"Marrow" is meant to be bone marrow, and a marrow scoop per se is a tableware for scooping up bone marrow from the bone for consumption.

　 Skues recognized a necessity of a stomach autopsy in order to investigate the stomach content of trout, but he hated the procedure because he had to do the dirty work of cutting open the belly of a trout in order to take the stomach contents out into the open.　Therefore he arrived at the idea of inserting a slender spoon through the mouth of a trout into the stomach to scoop the contents up.　The result was satisfactory and he introduced the marrow scoop in his book "Nymph Fishing for Chalk Stream Trout" (1939) including a photograph.　The width of the spoon was about 1.5 cm, and the length was about 24 cm.

　 When he caught a trout, he gave it a blow to the head and used the marrow scoop, so he could obtain a sufficient quantity of stomach content immediately without cutting the trout open.　He mentioned that it is easy to observe the stomach content if it is put into a small white plate filled with water.

　 At present a stomach pump is commonly used for the same purpose.　Since a trout is not hurt by a stomach pump, the procedure can be done on a live trout, and when released, it will swim away vigorously.

　

Black-and-white picture:

Caption: The photograph in the Nymph Fishing for Chalk Stream Trout written by Skues.

　

【Reference】Nymph fishing for chalk stream trout, 1960 (1939).

→ stomach autopsy, stomach pump