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regulation be worth some one's while to engage a sufficient labour force where- 

 with to exploit it. Much preferable is it to do away entirely with open seasons 

 and to regulate fishing by the issue from time to time of permits defining the 

 numbers to be removed under each. This is done in respect of many species of 

 large game which are accorded protection in the jungles of India, Ceylon, 

 Africa and North America ; it is a regulation which enables the licences issued 

 to be proportioned to the varying abundance from year to year of the species 

 involved. Should the numbers increase beyond a certain limit, permits are 

 issued freely, while if the species become thinned out too greatly, the issue of 

 permits may be suspended entirely till recovery takes place. 



110. Oyster beds are particularly liable to damage from over-fishing; in 

 the majority of natural beds the every day risks against which the beds have to 

 struggle are so many and dangerous that the beds can but just make headway 

 and keep up their average population with a narrow margin of increase during 

 favourable seasons. Cumulative increase is very slow and the disregard or 

 ignorance of this truth is the cause of the present depleted condition of the 

 Sind beds. To ensure the continued prosperity of a bed no more oysters may 

 be taken from it in one year than the average number reared annually to a 

 marketable size. Every effort should be made to secure this but as I recognize 

 the difficulties in practice of ensuring such a result, the alternative of main- 

 taining a large breeding reserve of mature oysters at a central locality in each 

 system of creeks should be arranged for and this reserve jealously guarded 

 against interference. 



111. Another measure that would certainly prove of great benefit to the 

 beds would be the framing of regulations for the preservation of the present 

 cultch and its increase in the manner shortly to be suggested. From actual 

 observations and from statements made at past enquiries by fishermen and 

 others, it is evident that ruthlessness and needless waste have always been 

 characteristic of the conduct of this fishery. Dead and living oysters are 

 indiscriminately haled in great clumps from the beds, carried to the banks and 

 there culled ; little or no effort is made to restore the dead shells to the beds 

 they are left to litter the banks at a level where they are valueless. Degrada- 

 tion of the level of the beds follows and the surrounding sea of mud gradually 

 oozes in, filling the gaps whence cultch has been removed needlessly. For the 

 preservation of the few oyster patches now remaining in the creeks and for 

 their gradual extension and improvement, I consider the adoption and enforce- 

 ment of the following regulations to be necessary, namely, 



(1) The limitation of oyster fishing on each bed or series of beds to a 

 specified number of oysters per annum. 



(2) The reservation and maintenance of one or more patches of oysters 

 as breeding reserves at some central locality jin each principal system or 

 net work of creeks. 



(3) The interdiction of the removal from any bed of all oysters 

 measuring less than 2 inches or more than 6 inches in greatest length. 



(4) The replacement on the bed of all dead shells and other cultch 

 taken out during the removal of living oysters. 



(5) The inclusion in the terms of every fishing permit or license 

 given, of a condition binding the licensee to transport to the beds and 

 there deposit as directed a boat load of cultch stones, broken tiles, old 

 bricks and the like every time he visits the creeks for the purpose of 

 fishing oysters. 



(6) The licensing of each person engaged in the fishing of oysters. 



(7) The exaction of a fee upon all oysters fished from Government 

 beds. 



112. Limitation of fishing. This if adopted will involve the virtual 

 permanent closure of the creeks save for a few days in each year. This is the 

 procedure adopted with success in France to ensure the permanent success of 

 the one great natural oyster bed now remaining, that of Caucale in the bay 



