LETTER FROM HUNTOON OYSTER COMPANY RE- 

 GARDING SAMPLES OF SEED OYSTERS TAKEN 

 FROM OYSTER BKDS AT SAMI8H BAY, DAGGET 

 COUNTY, WASHINGTON. 



The Honorable George M. Bowers, U. S. Fish Commission, 



Fairhaven, Washington, July 10th, 1903. 



Mr. HeniT O'Malley, Woods Hole, Mass.: 

 Dear Sir: — 



By Great Northern Express (prepaid) we are today sending you 

 as per above address, two boxes of samples, taken from our oyster 

 beds at Samish Bay — an arm of Bellingham Bay, Skagit County, 

 Washington. 



This sample is submitted to show not only the great fertility and 

 richness in native oyster seed of the waters of lower Bellingham, 

 Bay, Skagit County. Washington, but to illustrate the method em- 

 ployed by the Huntoon Oyster Company in securing seedlings with 

 which to stock their beds. Material used is cast-off Salmon netting. 

 This particular piece was clipped July 9th, 1903, from a large sec- 

 tion deposited in the water on August 20th, 1902. Scrap tin, bark, 

 shells, gravel and other means for taking seed have been tested, but 

 the i-esults of the netting have been the most satisfactory, so far. 



Both boxes are marked for "exhibition" and should be taken 

 care of promptly on their arrival. We have packed them in moss 

 as you suggested, but the journey is a long one and the specimens 

 should not be allowed to remain in boxes till the exhibition opens 

 up some ten or twelve days hence. The flat box contains a choice 

 sample of our native oysters, as we caught them in the seed form, 

 the clean webbing having been placed in the waters over our beds 

 August 20th, 1902, so you must agree with us that their showing of 

 growth is something wonderful, ten months after the plain "catcher" 

 was set for spat. 



The "catcher" used is cast-off or discarded salmon fishing ma- 

 terial and we are fortunate in getting it here at a nominal cost, and 

 its advantages over gravel, sand, bark or brush are many. The De- 

 partment at one time recommended that we tiy scrap tin, but that 

 did not seem to do particularly well for us. We are the only people 

 who have tried to take seed with the webbing, but others will follow 

 us this year. We are now spreading our webbing for July and Au- 

 gust spat and shall have out over fifty acres, we believe. 



We also send you specimen of native oysters taken on shells 

 (clam shells) and on bark. The ac^vantages of the webbing are that 

 we can take the webbing with the seed thereon right to the beds we 



10!) 



