NOTES ON OYSTER CULTURE. 261 



Such is tte outline of the method of procedure^ evolved by many 

 experiments and many failures, which the Dutch have found to be 

 the best,, at least for their own locality. Good as it is, however, there 

 must occasionally come bad years when unfavourable weather ruins 

 the crop ; in 1888, for example, the severe winter wrought havoc 

 among the old oysters, the cold summer killed the spat. Hence 

 the enterprise of an oyster farm must be backed with a considerable 

 capital, not only because there can be no appreciable return on the 

 money invested for at least four years, and a bad season may defer 

 it even longer, but also because out of this capital some must be 

 held in reserve in order to replace the brood-oysters in case of dis- 

 aster (elsewhere of course than in the Schelde, where the brood- 

 oysters are on the dykes). On the other hand, however large the 

 capital, it will be utterly thrown away unless expended with the 

 most rigid economy ; and in this fact we probably find the chief 

 reason for the failure of so many oyster culture companies in England. 

 It has often been shown that it is perfectly possible to raise oysters 

 artificially in England, but it must be done at a less cost than the 

 market price of the oyster if a dividend is to be expected. Each 

 oyster raised by the Heme Bay Company was estimated by Mr. 

 Blake (Eep. Sel. Comm. Oyster Fisheries, 1876) to have cost them 

 £100. Most instructive in this connexion is the history of this un- 

 fortunate company. It was founded in 1864 with a capital of £100,000 

 and a right of " several oyster fishery " over nine square miles at 

 Herne Bay, in the estuai'y of the Thames. Before a single oyster 

 had been laid down no less than £43,700=*= had been spent ; its area 

 was utterly disproportionate to the remaining capital, and it gradually 

 dwindled away for want of vitality. f Against this, however, must 

 be set the fact that in a few places in England oyster farming with 

 collectors, &c., has been carried out for many years, if not with signal 

 commercial success at least without disaster ; but the problem of 

 raising oysters cheaply on a great scale has not as yet been solved 

 (except on paper) so far as England is concerned j and this, it may 

 be noted, is not for want of suitable localities. 



It is not my purpose to discuss here the means by which this 

 solution may be attained, but I cannot conclude without a reference 

 to one great obstacle to private enterprise in this direction, which 

 has been pointed out again and again by those who have interested 

 themselves in such subjects ; namely, the absolute impossibility in 

 the present state of legislation of ascertaining in many cases the 

 ownership of any particular section of foreshore. As soon as a piece 



* Preliminary and Parliamentary expenses, £12,600 ! 



f Its melancholy history may be read in the three Reports of the Inspector under the 

 Board of Trade, Mr. Walpole, dated 1875, 1876, and 1882. 



