34 Report ef the Board of Shell Fish Commissioners 



Skill and experience are most important factors in operating 

 a dredge : Account must be taken at all times of the kind of 

 bottom, the weight of the dredge, the speed of the boat and 

 the length of the line, otherwise more oysters will be left on the 

 dredged bottom than are brought away. Lieutenant Winslow 

 states in his report 5 that the data secured and published by 

 him are valuable only for a comparative study of the different 

 oyster grounds. The actual amount of oysters per square yard 

 on the ground covered could not be calculated from the results 

 of his examinations. He is positive, judging from the quanti- 

 ties of oysters caught by oystermen, that thfe number of oysters 

 really on the ground examined was many times the amount 

 indicated by his examinations. 



EXAMINATIONS WITH TONGS. 



Knowing that examinations of oyster grounds by means of 

 a dredge 6 are not valuable unless made by those expert in 

 handling dredges, and that to secure an equipment for carry- 

 ing out such a method satisfactorily would be very expensive, 

 the Commission adopted a method for examining the grounds 

 surveyed with tongs which has proved to be simple, reliable 

 and inexpensive. Frequent comparisons have been made dur- 

 ing the survey between the catch actually made per day by 

 oystermen tonging upon a particular bar, with the amount 

 which, according to the calculations made from the results of 

 examinations, they should be able to catch, and in most cases 

 the two amounts agreed remarkably closely. 



6 Page 8, of Winslow's report. 



eA number of examinations with a dredge were made during the sur- 

 vey of the Somerset County oyster grounds in order to compare the 

 present condition of certain bars with that which existed at the time 

 of the survey by Lieut. Winslow and to compare the results obtained 

 with tongs, with those with a dredge. 



