REPORT OF COMMISSIONERS OF INLAND FISHERIES. 29 
locality mentioned above will be gained from the following: On 
August 9, after they had become somewhat thinned, a square 
yard on the shore was staked out and the clams dug from it as 
carefully as possible. These were carefully picked over and all 
stones and shells sorted out. There were then ten pints of clams. 
Two pints were counted, the first yielding 1,200 clams, the second 
1,300. The average of the two pints was therefore 1,250, and the 
estimate for the clams (ten pints) taken from one square yard 1s 
12,500. In addition to these a considerable number, perhaps a 
thousand, were lost, being scattered by the tide. 
The Rate of Growth. 
The rate of growth of the clam, like that of the star-fish, is, un- 
der favorable circumstances, more rapid than is usually supposed. 
It was shown in the last Report that the rate of growth in the star- 
fish varied greatly according to the amount of food, and that of 
two healthy star-fishes of the same age one might be more than 
one hundred times the bulk of the other. The same variation, re- 
sulting from differences in food supply, 1s seen in the clams, though 
perhaps the difference is not so great. 
The growth of the clams, which set thick at Wickford, on Cor- 
nelius Island, was followed during the summer, and formed the 
basis for comparing the growth in other localities. The following 
figures, photographed life-size, will show the rate of growth of the 
clams in this locality. Figure 6 represents specimens taken July 
7; the larger of these are probably about five or six weeks old, 
judging from the data with regard to setting already mentioned. 
Any possible doubt that they are the set of this summer is re- 
moved by the fact that a large number of specimens set on the 
house-boat, which was put into the water on the first of May, were 
about the same size. 
The succeeding figures, from 7 to 14 inclusive, are all life-size 
photographs of clams taken from the same locality as those in 
Fig. 6, at various times during the summer. ‘The specimens pho- 
