1883.] on Oysters and the Oyster Question. 357 



But surely nothing is more obvious than this, that the prohibition 

 of taking the oysters from an oyster bed during four months of the 

 year is not the slightest security against its being stripped clean (if 

 such a thing be possible) during the other eight months. Suppose, 

 that in a country infested by wolves, you have a flock of sheep, 

 keeping the wolves off during the lambing season will not afford 

 much protection if you withdraw shepherd and dogs during the rest of 

 the year. 



These considerations are so obvious, that I cannot but think that 

 the cry for close time for oysters must be based on a confused notion 

 that, as close time is good for salmon, so it must be good for oysters. 

 But there is really no analogy between the two things which here pass 

 under the name of " close time " Close time for oysters is merely 

 protection of oysters dui-ing the breeding season ; close time for 

 salmon is not merely protection of salmon during the breeding season, 

 it means a practical limitation of the captui-e of salmon all the year 

 round by the weekly close time, supplemented by the license duties 

 on rods and nets. You might protect the breeding grounds of salmon 

 as strictly as you pleased and as long as you pleased ; but, if too 

 many of the ascending fish were captured, the stock would fall off, 

 and if all were captured, it would come to an end. 



If the protection afforded to an oyster bed is to be made equivalent 

 to that given to a salmon river, measures must be taken by which the 

 undue diminution of the stock of oysters, at any time, may be pre- 

 vented. The most effectual way of doing this is to form an estimate 

 of the number of oysters on a bed before the commencement of the 

 open season ; and to permit the removal of only such a percentage as 

 will leave a sufficient stock. And regulations of this nature have 

 long been carried out in the Schleswig oyster fisheries and in those of 

 France. A subsidiary regulation, tending towards the same end, is 

 that which enforces the throwing back into the sea of all half-grown 

 oysters. As oysters produce young before they are half-grown, this 

 procedure must contribute to the breeding stock. 



When, nearly twenty years ago, my colleagues. Sir James Caird, 

 Mr. Shaw-Lefevre, and I, had to deal with the oyster question, I am 

 not aware that any of us doubted the value of protection of public 

 oyster beds in the open sea, if it could only be made efficient. 



What we are quite clear about, however, was : — 



(1) That the close time regulation which then existed was always 

 useless, and sometimes mischievous. 



(2) That the regulation prohibiting the taking of half-grown 

 oysters interfered with the transfer of oysters from the public beds, 

 where they were exposed to all sorts of dangers, to the private grounds 

 where they were protected. 



(3) That it was practically impossible to establish an efficient 

 system of protection on our public oyster beds. 



And therefore we came to the conclusion that the best course that 



