950 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [8] 
Ill-success of breeding in parks; the currents.—The idea, at first, was 
not to collect the embryos at the mouths of rivers or along the shores. 
Aware of the extraordinary fecundity of the oyster, and knowing its 
period of spawning, it was supposed that all that was necessary was to 
transfer the adult oysters to basins, arrange collectors near them, and 
leave the rest to nature. 
This method, which led many culturists to employ clusters (ruches) 
of tiles, where the spawning oysters were fastened upon shells or other 
collectors, was recommended by Coste. If one adult oyster produces 
2,000,000 embryos, thousands of such oysters would yield the thousands 
of millions, required to satisfy the public demands, and that too within 
a very restricted area. Such was the reasoning employed, which ap- 
peared as striking as it was logical. 
The method of proceeding is described in all of Coste’s letters, regard- 
ing the industry at Marennes. ‘ Each establishment,” he says, “thus 
transformed into an actual factory, where man controls the influencing 
conditions and varies them at will, performs the double function of an 
artificial oyster bank, supplying spawn, and of a perfect collector for the 
attachment of the spat; in this manner, those oysters which have become 
adult and marketable will be replaced each year by their own progeny, 
carefully brought together and bred in the place of their birth; thus, by 
this indefinite rotation, a constant renewal is produced.” 
The attempts made to carry out this process at Morbihan resulted in 
completely upsetting this plausible theory. 
Breeding in basins was found to be unprofitable. Such was the con- 
clusion then arrived at, and this conclusion is to-day considered indis- 
putable. What is the cause of it? The question is one which it would 
be quite useful for us to solve; for, in order to progress in so delicate a 
matter as the breeding of oysters, it is necessary to study all the phe- 
nomena, and even those which, at first sight, appear to be of secondary 
importance. We have said above that the young oyster, with its em- 
bryo shell, when first set free by the parent, is furnished with a tempo- 
rary swimming apparatus, which enables it to move about and remain 
suspended in the water. Ina closed basin, the young oysters, when they 
issue forth, fall to the bottom, and whether there be any mud or slime 
there or not, or anything beyond the proper bodies arranged to receive 
them, but a very small proportion attach themselves. Certain culturists, 
among them M. Charles, who own important breeding establishments 
near Lorient, attribute the ill-success to the saltness of the water in the 
basins, and its temperature. Besides, according to the latter, the oysters 
when they are placed in the basins are notin a healthy condition; being 
transported, handled, and moved about, during the period of fecunda- 
tion, conception takes place under unfortunate circumstances, and the 
issue is but an abortion, producing still-born offspring. According to 
others, and Coste foresaw this difficulty, it is impossible to have a basin 
without some mud and ooze, in which the young oysters perish. While 
