[31] OYSTER CULTURE. 783 
annual deposit of new germs, which develop under favorable conditions 
of shelter, light, and temperature. When the fishing season arrives the 
owners or leasers of these artificial banks take up the stakes and bundles 
of fagots, select without any trouble from among the oysters which cover 
them those of a suitable size for the market, and then replace the stakes, 
&c.; the remaining oysters continue their growth, and the vacant places 
become filled another season with a new lot. The industry at Lake 
Fusaro, which has prospered for centuries, employs, as can be readily 
seen, only methods of great simplicity—probably the same as were used 
by Sergius Orata—and it teaches for our benefit, that by careful and 
skilful management, aided by suitable means of collecting the spawn of 
the oyster, all of which is neither difficult nor expensive, one can indefi- 
nitely multiply this bivalve, while the processes employed by us at pre- 
sent lead only to the ruin of our naturally excellent beds. At Marennes, 
upon both sides of the mouth of the Seudre, a similar industry is per- 
petuated, and is being developed more and more under the patronage of 
the state, but unfortunately it is merely directed to the work of bringing 
to perfection these animals taken from the sea and transplanted in the 
new regions without any effort to reproduce and multiply them. In 
spacious live-ponds, called claires, constructed upon a definite plan, to 
be described in one of the following chapters, are placed the oysters ta- 
ken from the sea, preference being given to those about 12 to 18 months 
old; that is, much below marketable size. These claires are so arranged 
as to allow of a careful inspection on the part of the breeders, to facili- 
tate the distribution of the sea-water at will, the clearing of the bottom, 
and the gathering of the products. In these claires the oysters are 
arranged by hand upon the bottom, which has been made hard and free 
from mud; they are so deposited that they do not crowd one another 
or lie in piles, and are left there to increase in size, grow fat, and acquire 
that greenish color which is so much desired by amateurs. During the 
period of their growth the water is renewed only during the spring-tides. 
The additional labor consists simply in regulating the depth of water 
over them according to age and temperament, in changing them from one 
claire to another if any danger arises of their becoming covered with mud 
and thus smothered, and in culling them according to size. In about two 
years they attain marketable size, and compensate largely by their extra 
value for the necessary outlay in their rearing. This method is far from 
perfect, since in the first place the great mistake is made of drawing 
from the claires only one-half of what they might be made to produce. 
As breeding places they ought also to be places of reproduction and mul- 
tiplication, and they might be such, as has been often shown accidentally. 
But, such as it is, it offers us a good model as a method of management, 
and also an argumentin favor of the new industry, the reality and sue- 
cess of which is, I trust,no longer doubted by the reader; thus we can 
enter without fear upon the details of the practical workings of oyster 
culture, which we shall proceed to develop in the following chapters. 
