that, after a stated time, the progeny of the introduced specimens, if there be any, 

 may be lawfully marketed. 



My thanks are due to Mr. George King, of Oyster City, for much volunteer 

 labor and assistance in the experiment. 



What is an Oyster? 



The old conundrum and its answer, "Why is an oyster 

 like an elephant? Because neither can climb a tree," 

 does not, strangely enough, convey a sufficiently clear 

 idea of the oyster's anatomy and life history to satisfy 

 the mind of the average citizen, and I have been asked 

 by friends to tell what oysters are and something about 



p. their habits. 



Fig. I. 



The animal sub-kingdom known as Mollusca contains the snails, clams, oys- 

 ters, devil fish, &c., — animals which have very soft bodies which may or may not 

 be protected by a shell. In this sub-kingdom occur several classes, one of which the 

 Lamellihranchiata, (i. e. Mollusca furnished with plate-like gills) includes the 

 clams and oysters, in other words, all the bivalves. The oyster family, Ostrpidae, 

 belonging to this class contains all the oysters in whatever part of the world they 

 may live; the small oyster of our northwest coast, the so-called eastern oyster, the 

 European oyster, the pearl oyster, etc. All possess certain characteristics in com- 

 mon which place them in the same family. Furthermore, the genus Ostren, one 

 division of the family, includes more than 70 species, of which our west coast oys- 

 ter, Ostrea /ymrfa and the eastern oyster, Ostrra Virginica 

 are the two forms we are most interested in. Lastly, the 

 eastern oyster takes different shapes and reaches different 

 sizes in different localities and receives different colloquial 

 names. East Rivers, Princess Bays, Baltimores, Blue Points, 

 &c., but these are all the same species whether they are 

 found in the deep cold water of the Gulf of St. Lawrence or 

 in the warmer waters of the Gulf of Mexico. All oysters 

 love a bottom of shell and mud, or gravelly mud, not too soft, for m such they 

 would become smothered. In the spawning season the optimum temperature for 

 the eastern oyster is between 70° and 80° F., and they are accustomed as a rule to 

 much fresher water than is our west coast oyster. 



The eggs of the eastern oyster when first laid are irregular in shape and each 

 egg is about 1-500 of an inch in its longest diameter. (See Fig. i. ) These eggs are 

 ejected into the water while our oyster (^Osirea lurida) retains its eggs inside of 

 ts shell until the embryos are far along in their development. As if to compensate 

 for the lack of protection in the former species, a very care- 

 ful estimate places the number of eggs laid at one spawn- 

 ing by a single eastern oyster at 60,000,000 (only a very 

 small portion of them survives) while our small oyster lays 

 \onl}- between one and two millions. If the egg of the east- 

 ^ern oyster floating in the water, does not shortly meet a 

 -,perm cell it quickly dies. About two hours after being fertil- 

 ized it becomes round (Fig. 2) and shortly begins to seg- 

 ment, forming 2, then 4, then 8, then 16 cells and so on. 



