REPORT OF COMMISSIONERS OF INLAND FISHERIES. 131 



With a constant supply of fry sufficient to fill the plant to its full 

 capacity throughout the season, this estimate could probably be 

 raised. 



As has been stated before, many features of the present installation 

 are to be considered as vestigial structures and others as designed for 

 one function and adapted to another in the course of the evolution 

 of the plant. A new plant, therefore, built to operate the same 

 rearing cars would be different in many details. The cost of a plant 

 capable of duplicating the work of the one at Wickford has been 

 calculated by Mr. E, W. Barnes, superintendent of the Wickford 

 plant, at approximately $2,000, specified as follows: 



Cost of a Rearing Plant Consisting of 24 Rearing Boxes Capable of Turn- 

 ing OUT over 500,000 Lobsterlings in a Season. 



2^ horse-power engine $200 24 boxes $350 



Houseboat 300 Miscellaneous supplies 200 



Four rafts 350 



•Gearing 400 Total $1,800 



The above items have been figured economically, but quite liberally; and in 

 localities where materials can be readily secured, the cost might be considerably 

 lessened. The actual cost of rearing lobsters to the fourth stage is a little less 

 than S3 per 1,000. This includes labor, food, gasoline, and in fact all necessary 

 running expenses, but does not include the cost of egg lobsters. 



This amount would, of course, vary with the time and place where 

 the plant was constructed and also with the kind of materials used. 



Self-protective ability of fourth-stage lobsters. — An acquaintance with 

 thousands of fourth-stage lobsters from personal observation and 

 through the special scientific studies of members of our staff increases 

 even our former estimate of their superiority over the larval lobsters. 

 Immediately after arriving at this stage they are able to crawl over 

 the bottom, to burrow and hide, to fight, and to forage in a most 

 striking contrast to the larval lobsters in any stage of development. 

 In the first few daj^s of the fourth stage the lobsterlings are good 

 swimmers — this is their "redeeming vice" — but the swimming is 



