T1IK OYSTKK IMH'STIJY. 541 



where upon the coast was filled, more or less, with drifting oyster -spat during the spawning 

 season, whether there were any lieds of oysters in the immediate neighborhood 01 not; in other 

 words, that there was hardly any limit to the time and distance the .spat would drift with tin 1 

 tides, winds, and currents. As a consequence of the opinion, it was believed that one place was 

 as good as another to spread shells tor spawn so long as there was a swift current or tideway 

 there. But this view was fallacious, and many acres of shells never exhibited a .single oyster, 

 simply because there was no spat or .sources of spat in their vicinity. 



Having learned this, planters began to see that they must place with or near their beds of 

 shells living mother oysters, called '' spawners," which should supply the desired spat. This is 

 done in two ways, either by laying a narrow bed of old oysters across the tideway in the center 

 of the shelled tract, so that the spawn, as it is emitted, maybe carried up and down over the 

 breadth of shells waiting to accommodate it, or by sprinkling spawners all about the ground, at 

 the rate of say 10 bushels to the acre. Under these arrangements the circumstances must be 

 rare and exceptional when a full set will not be secured upon all shells within '20 rods or so of the 

 spawuers. Of course fortunate positions may be found where spawn is produced from wild 

 oysters in abundance, or from contiguous planted beds, in which the distribution, of special 

 spawuers is unnecessary ; yet even then it may be said to be a wise precaution. The experience 

 of old planters in Brookhaven Bay, Long Island, has been steadily confirmatory of this. 



PREPARATION OP GROUND. It was not long before a scarcity of suitable ground was felt at 

 the principal centers of production for the carrying on of this new oyster culture. Planters then 

 began to turn their attention toward preparing muddy bottoms by forming over them an artificial 

 crust as a basis for the " stools" or "cultch."* In Ehode Island the planters prepare unsuitable 

 -round by paving it. This is done early in the spring, 10,000 bushels of shells, say, being thrown 

 on, at an expense of from $250 to $300. Then, in June, when the shells have settled well into the 

 mud and formed a strong surface, more clean shells are scattered with a quantity of large living 

 oysters just ready to spawn 100 bushels of "mothers" to 3.0(10 or 1.000 bushels of shells. Great 

 success in several instauces has followed this plan, particularly in Greenwich Bay and Apponaug 

 Cove. One planter told me that he put down, in 1877, about *1U~> worth of stools and mother- 

 oysters at the latter place, and calculated that he obtained, in a few weeks, slO,0(i(> worth of seed; 

 but a little later it all died why, he is unable to guess. Another gentleman, at the same place, 

 in 187'J, put down 1,GOO bushels of shells and GO bushels of spawning or mother oysters. In the 

 immediate vicinity of these he got a good set; but on a closely adjacent bed, where there were no 

 "mothers,'' not a young oyster was to lie seen. He had had the same experience in the Kickamait. 

 Ou the other hand, the simple tumbling over of shells in the hope of catching drifting spawn has 

 proved almost universally a failure, here. 



DEEP WATER OYSTER CULTURE AT NEW HAVEN. This new system of deep-water oyster 

 culture has been carried out more systematically at New Haven, Conn., however, than at any 

 other point on our coast. 



I'.y 1870 the business of catching and cultivating native, home-bred o\sters at Xew Haven 

 had grown into a definite and profitable organization. It was not long before all the available 

 inshore bottom was occupied, and the lower river and harbor looked like a submerged forest, so 

 thickly were planted the boundary stakes of the various beds. Encroachments naturally followed 



* This word, often shortened into " midi," is an importation (Yoni Knropr, and has undergone changes. Inili* 



tin-!-. il v "I' my monograph I ilrlilircl it MS ' material placed ill the water (n ealeh I he spawn cil' 1 lie. oyster." That, is 

 the way in which it is used in New Kn.nlunil ; hut in Europe i! is tin- */> ilsrlf, :nitl n,.| ihe Mool 1o -which it 

 lastrus, that is called "cultcli." The latter is evidently rtyiiioloj^iually eoncc I , and our American signification ia an 

 erroneous and perverted use. 



