REPORT OF COMMISSIONERS OF INLAND FISHERIES. 25 



well as pure, well aerated and circulating water and proper food, 

 contribute to develop the new-born larvte farther and to bring them 

 in the shortest possible time to the bottom stage. 



For us an outlook so satisfactory on the practicability of artifi- 

 cial lobster culture must naturally involve the question whether 

 and how far the approved new method of culture is applicable to 

 our local conditions at home. 



The answer must unfortunately be in the negative. 



The roadsteads of the island of Helgoland are far too unprotected 

 and rough to permit breeding experiments to be ventured at all 

 upon anchored floats. In America they were carried on, as has 

 already been said, in an entirely protected bay with calm water. 

 It admits of no doubt that like favorable conditions may be fgund 

 on the British coast as well as in the fiords of Norway, and per- 

 haps also on the Austrian coast of the Adriatic, where also there 

 is great complaint of the diminishing of the lobster supply. In 

 Helgoland, as far as we can now see ahead, the lobster-culture 

 experiments must always be confined to the small scale of the labor- 

 atory, which at any rate permits the demonstration to visitors to the 

 Helgoland exhibition aquarium the hatching and culture of the lob- 

 ster and afford the opportunity, not to be undervalued, for obser- 

 vation on the moulting and growth of the lobster, but which never 

 will attain practical significance for maintaining or increasing the 

 Helgoland lobster supply. 



If now, on the one hand, we at Helgoland lack the possibility 

 of carrying on practical lobster raising, yet, on the other hand, it is 

 satisfactory to know that there exist no serious indications of en- 

 dangering the Helgoland lobster supply through fishing, so that 

 there has not yet arisen a grave need of recourse to the aid of artificial 

 culture. 



The fishery is carried on in a very rational manner, and the obser- 

 vance of a three months closed season in summer, a minimum 

 size fixed by law, and last, not least, also the peculiar life-condi- 

 tions of the lobster, which afford it a very strong protection, have 



