244 Our Food Mollusks 



charted at this time. There had come a great decline in 

 the yield of the Chesapeake. In the year 1889 the de- 

 mand greatly increased, and the attention of Baltimore 

 packers was drawn to this newly discovered source of 

 supply made known through Winslow's survey. Many 

 of them sent their vessels south to " develop " the new 

 territory. Large quantities of oysters were dredged and 

 sent to Baltimore, where they were marketed by can- 

 ners and dealers in raw oysters as the product of Ches- 

 apeake Bay. 



Pamlico Sound oysters were inferior to those taken 

 from the Chesapeake, chiefly because they were from 

 beds that had never been dredged or extensively tonged. 

 Having grown undisturbed, they were clustered, but 

 because the bottom was hard, they were not so extremely 

 elongated as on the river reefs, and many were large 

 and of good shape. 



The appearance of the Chesapeake dredgers made a 

 great and sudden change in the modest industry of 

 North Carolina. Previous to the year 1889 oysters had 

 been gathered only from very shallow water by means of 

 primitive, short-handled, wooden-toothed rakes. From 

 all the waters of the state the number taken had seldom 

 exceeded a hundred thousand bushels. Competition in 

 the markets with other states had been impossible, and 

 only local needs had been met. 



But now there had come a great general demand with 

 high prices. There had suddenly appeared a number of 

 experienced oystermen with implements entirely new to 

 the region. The native tongers for the first time learned 

 of the long-handled, basket-like, iron-headed tongs used 

 in the Chesapeake, and they soon profited by the knowl- 

 edge. Formerly they had been content to fish within a 





