1236 OYSTERS, AND ALL ABOUT THEM. 



These cases are, however, exceptional, the usual results 

 of an outlet of sewage being the complete destruction to 

 the oyster-beds it contaminates. 



The question of the pollution of rivers is very impor- 

 tant to oyster culturists ; and these pollutions are such a 

 hindrance to the proper development of other fisheries, 

 that it would be as well to give some of the facts ascer- 

 tained of late years as to the effects of sewage and other 

 pollutions. 



LIVERPOOL. The Mersey has suffered very consider- 

 ably in this way ; one of the witnesses examined by the 

 Inspectors of Sea Fisheries stated that he recollected when 

 the banks on both sides of the river were clean sand, and 

 the Bay at Waterloo a light-coloured clean sand. He also 

 remembered when a wreck at Rock Lighthouse was covered 

 with small mussels. " There are no mussels there now ! 

 The bank of the river consists of dirty sludge. The sewage 

 and chemicals from Liverpool are materially injuring the- 

 fisheries, and the smell is obnoxious fourteen miles out." 

 A complaint was also made that the steam dredges are 

 continually depositing a large mass of hard stuff eight miles 

 north-west of the Bar lightship, and are destroying a valu- 

 able trawling-ground. 



GUERNSEY. The practice of depositing ballast round 

 the coasts of Guernsey has destroyed a valuable trawling- 

 ground, and rendered the adjacent waters unfit for oysters. 

 This practice has, however, been discontinued (1882). 



TYNE. The hoppers bring down large quantities of 

 dirt from the bed of the river, and refuse from the alkali 

 and other manufactories. The Tyne Commissioners alone 

 dredged up 500,000 tons of rubbish in one year ; " this 

 deposit has filled up the crevices in the rocks, and crabs 

 and lobsters have almost entirely disappeared." 



