146 Report of the Board of Shell Fish Commissioners 



Water deeper than twelve feet was found on none of the 

 natural bars and no oyster ground extended beneath water 

 shallower than four feet, the average depth being about eight 

 feet. The oyster-producing bottoms are in the main composed 

 of a mixture of sand and mud and are sticky or hard, but 

 patches of hard sand, gravel, clay and soft black mud were 

 found. In the soft bottoms clams abounded and a considerable 

 quantity of sponge was observed attached to the shells on the 

 bars in the western part of the sound. 



Bottoms in nine localities, covering an area of 1,965 acres, 

 having been pointed out by the local assistant as oyster pro- 

 ducing, were surveyed and examined by the Commission. Of 

 this area, 1,478 acres were found in a condition such as to come 

 within the adopted definition of a natural oyster bar and was 

 charted and buoyed as such. The remaining area of 487 acres 

 was not charted and buoyed as natural oyster bars, it being too 

 depleted of oysters to yield a livelihood to tongers and too 

 depleted of shells to afford a basis for the attachment or spat in 

 the future. 



The natural oyster bars which existed in this section in 1878 

 covered' an area of 7,296 acres, according to the survey made by 

 Lieutenant Winslow, and are described on page 33 of the report, 

 referred to on page 33, under the title "Pocomoke Beds." The 

 local names by which the separate bars are known have so 

 changed since 1878 that it is difficult to identify the bars which 

 now exist with those surveyed by Lieutenant Winslow. This 

 change in name is evidence which bears out the results of the 

 survey just "completed and shows that profound changes have 

 taken place in the oyster-producing areas of Pocomoke Sound 

 since 1878. During the interval of twenty-seven years between 

 the two surveys 5,809 acres of oyster-producing bottoms have 

 become so exhausted as to no longer afford a livelihood to tong- 

 ers. To 487 acres only of this once productive but now ex- 

 hausted oyster ground has any claim been made by oystermen 

 and this claim is based, not upon the plea that the ground still 

 produces oysters, but that it is valuable clamming bottom, a 

 claim which the Shell Fish Commission has no authority to 

 consider. 



The continuous depletion and exhaustion of the natural bars 

 which has taken place in Pocomoke Sound since 1878 at the 



