OYSTER CULTURE IN FRANCE. 483 



Acting upon the advice of M. Coste, the system of 

 cultivation that had been so long and successfully carried 

 on at Lake Fusaro was, with one or two slight modifica- 

 tions, strongly recommended by the French Government 

 to the people as being the most suitable to follow, and 

 experiments were at once entered upon with a view to 

 prove whether it would be as practicable to cultivate oysters 

 among the agitated waves of the open sea as in the quiet 

 waters of Fusaro. 



In order to settle this point, it was determined to 

 renew the old oyster beds of the Bay of St. Brieuc, and 

 immediate, almost miraculous, success was the result. 

 The fascines laid down soon became covered with spat, 

 and branches were speedily exhibited at Paris and other 

 places containing thousands of young oysters. The ex- 

 periments in oyster culture tried at St. Brieuc were com- 

 menced, early in the spring of 1859, on part of a space of 

 three thousand acres. A quantity of breeding oysters, 

 approaching to three millions, was laid down either on the 

 old beds, or on newly constructed longitudinal banks ; 

 these were sown thickly on a bottom composed chiefly of 

 immense quantities of old shells, the " middens " of Can- 

 cale in fact, where the shell accumulations had become a 

 nuisance ; so that there was a more than ordinary good 

 chance for the spat finding at once a proper holding-on 

 place. Then again, over some of the new banks, fascines of 

 boughs were sunk and chained over the beds, so as to 

 intercept any portion of the spawn that was likely, upon its 

 rising, to be carried away by the force of the tide. In less 

 than six months the success of the operations in the Bay of 

 St. Brieuc was assured, for at the proper season a great fall 

 of spawn had occurred, and the bottom shells were covered 

 with the spat, while the fascines were so thickly coated with 



Q2 



