CHAPTER VI 



CONDITIONS GOVERNING OYSTER 



GROWTH— OYSTER PLANT- 



ING IN AMERICA 



YSTER culture in America is very simple as 

 compared with that in Europe. There it is 

 difficult to obtain the young, or the " seed," 

 and laborious and costly methods are resorted 

 to in effecting its capture, and in protecting it during the 

 period of its growth. Here seed is abundant, growth is 

 vigorous, and bottoms are naturally better adapted to 

 the industry. 



The complicated methods, necessary for success in Eu- 

 rope, will not be employed in this country until the price 

 of oysters is relatively very much higher than it is there. 

 These foreign methods if introduced on our shores, 

 would reclaim much marshy shore-land now entirely un- 

 productive, and the American oyster would undoubtedly 

 respond to the treatment as the foreign form does. 

 Nevertheless, it will be many decades before the simpler 

 American method will be superseded by any other on our 

 coasts, if indeed the event ever occurs. 



There are two reasons for such a belief. One is that 

 the area along the American coast available for oyster 

 culture after the less expensive American method, is 

 enormous. No one can now accurately estimate its ex- 

 tent. It includes not only the territory formerly occu- 

 pied by " wild " oysters, but also great tracts where 



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