9Q2 OYSTERS, AND ALL ABOUT THEM. 



difficulty or great expense in obtaining a grant. Yet the 

 cost under the present Act in most cases is enormous ; in 

 that of the Blackwater it amounted to several thousand 

 pounds. Does this look like " facilitating" the establish- 

 ment, improvement, and maintenance of oyster-grounds ? 

 Is it not practically a veto ? 



As at the present time nearly all the public beds are 

 denuded of oysters, every facility should be given to the 

 fishermen in the neighbourhood of the once productive, 

 but now exhausted beds, to combine together and form 

 themselves into organized communities, like that of Whit- 

 stable. A sufficient area of the foreshore and sea being- 

 granted for their exclusive fishery, at a moderate percentage 

 of their returns, powers should be granted to them to form 

 by-laws for the regulation of the fishery, and magistrates 

 should have power to enforce fines and penalties under 

 such by-laws. 



If this were done, capital could be raised upon this 

 security, as was done by the Whitstable Company, who 

 borrowed 20,000 at the commencement of their fishery. 



The fishermen would then be induced to clean the 

 ground, and stock it with brood purchased from owners of 

 breeding-grounds, or bred by themselves. Every com- 

 pany or community of fishermen establishing breeding 

 grounds has a fair claim to the adjacent public-waters 

 (where not already productive), for the purpose of rearing 

 and maturing their crop of oysterlings. It should suffice 

 to prove, first, that the ground applied for is unproductive, 

 and, secondly, that the parties applying are in position to 

 restock the ground. Where these premises have been 

 established, the grant should follow as a matter of course, 

 and without any great expense, if any, to the applicants. 



