OYSTERS AND OYSTER FISHERIES OF OUEENSLAND. 



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separate categories of dredge-sections, oyster-banks, and oyster-grounds. Under the first-named 

 title are included extensive water areas producing dredge oysters onl}-, and not extending shore- 

 wards above the limit of low-water mark. These areas are leased by auction, for terms of fourteen 

 years, to the highest bidder. The waters of Moreton Bay were originally subdivided into fortj'-two 

 such sections. The value of certain of the more productive of these sections may be gauged, by 

 the fact that the rental realised for one of the more important ones, when recently put up to public 

 auction, was no less than _;^i,ooo per annum. Within the term " oyster-banks " are included 

 all oyster-bearing banks, reefs, or other areas, comprised within the limits of high-water mark and 

 two feet below the lowest ebb. For these areas, licenses are issued at the uniform rate of £^, for 

 any such bank not exceeding thirty acres in extent. The total number of banks marked off, 

 according to the latest returns, is in Moreton Bay 347, and in Wide Bay 167. In the Rock- 

 hampton district, including Rodd Harbour, Port Curtis, and Keppel Bay, between forty and fifty 

 similar banks have been licensed or are under survey. The subdivisions termed "oyster-grounds" 

 have been recently defined to take the place of "dredge-sections," for the purpose of includ- 

 ing areas producing oysters either in collectively deep or shallow water, or from high-water 

 mark on one side to the same limit on the opposite side, of any given area. These 03'ster- 

 grounds are, as in the case of the dredge-sections, let by auction on leases of fourteen years' 

 duration to the highest bidder. 



The license-fees payable upon the boats occupied in the oyster trade, as affixed by the 

 Oyster Act of the year 1S86, are as follows: ^i annually for every boat so employed that does 

 not exceed three tons, and a further sum of los. for every ton or part of a ton above the measure 

 ment. The license-fee charged for every person engaged as master, servant, or assistant in 

 dredging, collecting, or carrying away oysters, for sale, is los. per annum. 



Return, REL-iiTiVE to the Quantity and Value of Oysters Exported, fkom Brisbane and Maryborough. 



BRISBANE. 



