34 CONNECTICUT GEOL. AND NAT. HIST. SURVEY. [Bull. 



For the year ending June 30, 1910, the receipts in this state 

 from the sale of market and seed oysters and shells was 

 $1,892,759, while there remained on the beds in private areas 

 alone an estimated quantity of 3,784,175 bushels of oysters, 

 valued, with the stakes and buoys which mark the grounds, at 

 $1,856,285. During this year the industry gave employment to 

 2,703 persons.* 



For the mere privilege of controlling certain parts of the 

 floor of the Sound for the cultivation of oysters, the oyster 

 planters have paid over $260,000 into the treasuries of the state 

 and the towns adjoining the coast. f 



So serious is the starfish injury to the oyster industry that 

 the General Assembly of this State, in 1901, passed a law making 

 it illegal for any person to assist in the spread of the pest. The 

 law reads as follows : "Every person who shall wilfully deposit 

 or assist in depositing any starfish .... in any of the 

 navigable waters of this State .... shall be fined not more 

 than fifty dollars, or imprisoned not more than six months." 

 (Connecticut Shell-fish Commissioners' Report for 1903, page 

 xxvi.) 



The actual loss which the starfish causes to the oyster in- 

 dustry of the state is very difficult to determine with any de- 

 gree of precision. Any estimate even of the losses to a single 

 grower is, from the very nature of the case, largely a matter of 

 guess-work. Furthermore the natural beds suffer a great annual 

 loss, of which no one takes account. The loss to the new set, 

 when the individual is but a small fraction of an inch in diameter, 

 may actually be, and probably often is, greater than that caused 

 by the more conspicuous destruction of oysters of larger size. 

 The oyster grower who watches his plantations carefully knows 

 when the starfishes of larger size become numerous on his beds, 

 but he has no means of determining the injuries caused by the 

 young individuals to correspondingly young oysters. The fact 

 that a single starfish less than a month old has been shown to 

 be able to devour more than 50 young clams in six days, indicates 

 how extensive these injuries may become. 



* Report to the General Assembly, State of Connecticut, on the Investigation of 

 Oyster Properties by the Board of Equalization, 1910, page 77. 

 t Report Shell-fish Commissioners, 1907-08, page 82. 



