APPENDIX. 107 



It would be safe to assume that, even with well-enforced and uni- 

 form laws in the various States, the abundance of lobsters would not 

 be sufficient to keep pace with the increased demands of the market. 

 Some means of artificial propagation must be resorted to. 



B. ARTIFICIAL HATCHING AT THE STATIONS OF THE 

 UNITED STATES BUREAU OF FISHERIES. 



As artificial hatching had been successful, in the case of fishes, it 

 was naturally the first method to be tried with lobsters. When the 

 lobsters are received at these stations, the eggs are scraped off and 

 placed in jars to hatch. The MacDonald jar, well known through it 

 use in the hatching of shad, has been, till quite recently, the one made 

 use of, and has been quite successful, only a small percentage of eggs 

 failing to hatch. Within the past few years the station at Woods 

 Hole has used, with good results, the Downing jar instead of the Mac- 

 Donald. 



It was, however, pointed out long ago that few, perhaps not over 

 1 in 1,000 of the fry thus hatched ever reached the fourth stage. 

 Furthermore, hatching the eggs artificially possesses no advantage 

 over the natural method. It is safe to say that the egg lobster hatches 

 practically all the eggs that will hatch. No artificial method can do 

 as well. Even though the hatching can be perfected to such an extent 

 that the percentage very closely approximates the natural method, 

 there will be a great mortality before the fry can be liberated. This 

 would not occur in the natural state, because the eggs of a lobster do 

 not all hatch at one time, and consequently, in moving about over the 

 bottom, the egg lobster would scatter its fry over a wider area. Fur- 

 thermore, when the fry are liberated from the artificial hatchery, the 

 cloud which results from pouring out the thousands of larvae must 

 undoubtedly attract the attention of fishes, while the few which would 

 hatch at one time from the natural method might escape notice. 



Perhaps the principal thing which can be said in favor of artificial 

 hatching is that the practice of buying egg lobsters, usually at a pre- 



