FOURTEENTH ANNUAL MEETINC;. 87 



regulations in regard to the working of the beds, or the protec- 

 tion of the oysters during the breeding season, and no system of 

 guarding the beds, they were gradually despoiled and their 

 places taken by the planted areas ; and the same may be said as 

 regards the lower portion of Staten Island, and in fact, of all 

 portions of our State. To a certain extent, this is an advantage 

 to the oyster industry of the State, and to a certain extent it is a 

 disadvantage. By having these lands brought under the direct 

 influence of individual oystermen, that is, by transforming 

 them from public into private property, they can be better pro- 

 tected than when (jpen to every one, as each individual planter 

 will feel more of an interest in guarding his own land than in 

 guarding the land of the public domain, and they can accord- 

 ingly be worked in a manner to promote the ivelfare and con- 

 tinuance of the bed, rather than in such a manner as to exhaust 

 it as quickly as pcjssible. 



It is on the principle, of ccnirse, that business, in order to be 

 successful, must be personal to those engaged in it, and while 

 this may be largely true as regards the oyster property of the 

 State, yet if the beds are permitted to become exhausted in this 

 manner, and then to be taken up, as they have been in the past, 

 by any one who desires to appropriate this kind of property, it 

 will cut off a great number of people from obtaining seed 

 oysters, and furnish private property to a greater or less num- 

 ber of individuals, without any recompense being given, even 

 to the State, or to those deprived of the privilege of gathering 

 oysters from public beds. It would seem as if it would be bet- 

 ter to guard the public beds, and preserve them as seed grounds, 

 and encourage the planters to appropriate land for artificial cul- 

 tivation that is not suitable for natural growth, enacting suit- 

 able laws for the protection and guarding of the natural areas, 

 and for the perpetuity and protection of the planting industry. 

 Many of tlie oystermen feel at the present time that there is no 

 certainty, from the present condition of the laws, that they will 

 ever gain anything from any improvements they may make, or 

 for any expense that they may be to in fitting up territory which 

 is not now natural bottom, but which might be rendered excel- 

 lent for plants, and so they do not enter into the work as heart- 



