4 PEOTECTION OF FRESH-WATER MUSSELS. 



Eiver, the fishery gradually spread from stream to stream, passing 

 from depleted territor}' to new and rich fields, until it embraced prac- 

 tically the entire Mississippi Basin and a portion of the Great Lakes 

 drainage, from Minnesota to Louisiana, north and south, and from 

 Ohio, West Virginia, and Tennessee on the east to Arkansas, Kansas, 

 and South Dakota on the west. 



DEPLETION OF THE RESOURCES. 



Extension of territory could not be continued indefinitely. "\¥hile 

 up to the present time the industry has not failed to obtain shells in 

 quantity sufficient for the market demands, it has become perfectly 

 clear that the perpetuation of the industry as one producing a staple 

 product that is both good and within reach of all people depends 

 upon successful propagation and effective protection. The supply is 

 now maintained by regularly invading new territory (and it is 

 scarcely possible to go farther in this direction), by seeking out the 

 smaller tributaries of the mussel streams, which could not formerly 

 have been worked with profit, and in some measure by the devising of 

 methods that are more effective in capture of mussels. Notwithstand- 

 ing these developments, all of which indeed conduce to more exhaustive 

 fishery, an increasing proportion of very small shells is being taken^ 

 the bottoms are being more thoroughly cleaned, and the price of shell 

 has advanced to a relatively high figure. 



A high price for shell has, of course, its advantages. It is good 

 for the fishermen, provided they can find the shells, and it stimulates 

 the manufacturers to eliminate waste and to use the most economical 

 methods. On the other hand, if unbalanced by protective restric- 

 tions, a continued rise in price is of disastrous consequence. It im- 

 poverishes the beds by driving the fishermen to the most exhaustive 

 manner of fishing; even the very smallest shells that can be captured, 

 which should never be removed from the beds, are taken and mar- 

 keted, and this, unfortunately, is the actual case at the present time. 

 (See pi. I.) Ultimately the higher price of shell becomes an ele- 

 ment in the price of the finished product and is paid by the public at 

 large without corresponding advantage to a single person connected 

 with the industry. 



Let it be repeated that a high price to the fishermen is desirable, 

 but in the present condition they reap no benefit. A higher price 

 for a disproportionately smaller product brings no added profit. 

 None are so directly interested in the conservation of mussels as the 

 fishermen themselves. 



Of what advantage is it to the fishermen of the Wabash River, 

 or to the State of Indiana, that shells are now more valuable, when 

 a river that once supported a really important shelling industry is 



