THE SPONGE FISHERY. 831 



although it is doubtful if the regular fleet is yet extensive enough to accomplish such a result. 

 A scheme to provide for a rotation in the grounds fished over, from year to year, would appear to 

 offer the best methods of preserving the supply, and might be easily arranged. lu this manner 

 each section would be allowed a certain period (the number of years to be determined by experi- 

 ment) in which to recover its growth, and the danger of permanent injury would be avoided. 

 Such a course is pursued in connection with many of the oyster- banks of the Connecticut coast, 

 with most beneficial results. 



It is claimed that some of the Key West buyers have encouraged the spongers in their indis- 

 criminate fishing, and that they are largely to blame for the inferior character of much of the pres- 

 ent supply. In an editorial, in one of its issues for 1880, the "Oii, Paint, and Drug Eeporter", of 

 New York, published the following remarks upou this subject: 



" The medium and large sponges therefore bring considerably advanced prices, while the small 

 ones are more or less a loss to the merchant. These irregular sizes have led to frauds in packing, 

 it being a common practice with many to ' top off' their .bales with good sizes, and make up the 

 bulk with small ones. Thus an annoying evil has grown into the trade, despite the strenuous 

 efforts of the honest dealers to prevent it ; but still more serious results seem to promise for the 

 future, in the entire exhaustion of these fisheries, which have hitherto afforded a field for an im- 

 portant industry. It is evident that the constant scouring of the reefs will have the same effect 

 upon them that would occur to oyster-beds if they were constantly dredged, or upou game pre- 

 serves it they were not protected for certain periods each year from the ravages of the sportsman." 



Natural causes sometimes occasion great injury to the sponge-grounds, as in the case of the 

 so-called u Poisoned waters," which, although occurring at irregular and generally long intervals, 

 appear to destroy nearly every living thing in the area within their influence. Not only are the 

 free-swimming fishes thus affected, but also all the lower forms of life, attached to or growing upou 

 the bottom. According to Mr. Ernest Ingersoll, this plague was severely felt in 1844, 1854, 1878, 

 and 1880, and also occurred to some extent in the intervening periods. Several theories have 

 been advanced to account for its appearance. Some think it is due to the overflow of swamp waters 

 from the mainland, but others trace its origin to subterranean causes of volcanic origin, giving 

 rise to poisonous gases, which ascend and pollute the waters. The latter belief is strengthened by 

 the fact that the poisoned waters of 1878 and 1880 were immediately preceded by earthquake 

 shocks, felt throughout the southwestern part of Florida. Mr. Ingersoll's account of the fatality in 

 1878, so far as concerns the sponges, is as follows : 



" The earliest indication of it was the floating up of vast quantities of dead sponges, chiefly 

 ' loggerheads.' All of those seen by Mr. Brady were less than 40 miles north of Key West, in what 

 is known as ' The Bay,' nor has anything of the sort been seen at any time outside (i. e., south- 

 ward or eastward) of the Florida Reefs ; but it was soon discovered that all the hitherto profitable 

 spongiiig-gTounds lying off the coast as far north nearly as Cedar Keys, and particularly off the 

 Auclotes, had been ruined. These grounds are only now beginning to show signs of reproductive- 

 ness in sponges. The abandonment of these spongiug-grouuds from the reefs to Cedar Keys, dur- 

 ing the three or four years following this attack, entails a loss which it is hard to estimate, because 

 partially compensated in the increased price of the article in the market, due to its consequent 

 scarcity; and because at all times the product there is an uncertain quantity; but I hazard the 

 opinion that $100,000 would not repair the damage to this business interest alone. Had it not 

 been for the fortunate discovery just at that time of the sponge tracts oft Rock Island, northward 

 of the Suwanee River, almost a famine in this article would have ensued." 



