280 Our Food Mollusks 



laws governing beach rights, and are ready to formulate 

 new ones giving irrevocable titles to clam bottoms, the 

 clam industry will quickly become established on a safe 

 basis, and its growth will be rapid. This battle for 

 property rights on the shore, and for protection, has 

 been fought and won by the oystermen, and to the satis- 

 faction of all ; and it must be fought in the same way by 

 the prospective clam culturists. The result will be the 

 same, and immense wealth will be produced from lands 

 now entirely barren and useless. 



Common names given to plants and animals are local, 

 while the technical or " scientific names " that often 

 cause so much popular amusement by their length or un- 

 familiar sound, are universal names. A form is often 

 given one common name in one locality, and others else- 

 where. The large mouthed black bass, for example, is 

 also called the Oswego bass in the North, while the same 

 fish is known as the trout in some of the southern states. 

 At least thirty other common names are given to this 

 fish in different localities. Along the shore, the name 

 dogfish refers to a species of shark, while inland it desig- 

 nates a very distantly related form. The lay reader may 

 readily appreciate the necessity of a technical and uni- 

 versally employed system for the naming of a species, if 

 he will consider the case of the clam. The name clam 

 north of Cape Cod usually refers simply to Mya arenaria, 

 though it may, in some localities, designate Mactra 

 solidissima, the sea clam. From Rhode Island to the 

 Carolinas the term might refer not only to Mya and 

 Venus (the little neck, hard clam, or quahaug), but to 

 half a dozen allied forms. From Florida to Texas, 

 Venus, Pecten (the scallop), Pholas, Gnathodon, and 

 several others are " clams." Not only does one term 



