14 



1921 was that known as " Church Scar," and this is subject 

 to recent and significant sewage pollution. The adjacent shore 

 is the locus of a good, residential population, and it is a well- 

 known holiday resort, so that the contamination of the sea 

 in its vicinity cannot be said to be free from danger. It is a 

 place where people may go to recuperate after illness, and so 

 there is always the chance that convalescent typhoid patients, 

 who are still in the infective stage, may be temporarily resident 

 there. The distance between the mussel beds and the sewer 

 outfalls is short, and so quite a small period of time may elapse 

 between the discharge of dejecta into privies ashore and the 

 fouling of the mussels with the resultant sewage, which is 

 quite untreated. There has actually been a barge (with a 

 privy on board) moored on the Scar and inhabited by workmen, 

 but we are inclined to regard this contributory source of pollu- 

 tion as less objectionable than that resulting from the much 

 better-off population living in the St. Annes-Lytham district. 



The case is rather different with regard to the pollution 

 of the channel adjacent to the training walls. Much of this 

 must have its origin at Preston and the distance is therefore 

 considerable and the pollution remote in point of time. 

 Bacteriologically there is little difference between the two 

 regions (1) and (2), but the strong impression made on Messrs. 

 Scott and Birtwistle in 1921 and on myself in 1913 was that the 

 bacteriological evidence might safely be neglected so far as 

 the training wall mussels were concerned. Thus we disregard 

 the bacteriological evidence, though the latter shows that the 

 contamination both at Church Scar and on the training walls 

 is gross in its degree. It is fair to say that the conditions on 

 Church Scar are such that closure is to be urged, but this 

 conclusion we are reluctant to make in the case of the other 

 locality. 



Something must therefore be said as to the general question 

 of shellfish pollution by way of justifying these findings and 



