American Fisheries Socvety. 235 
times their original bulk in the first year and it required seven 
years to raise completely matured and merchantable sponges. 
The chief difficulty, aside from the hostility of the inhabitants, 
appears to have arisen from the destruction of the supports by 
teredos and other boring organisms. It was found, too, that 
direct sunlight was inimical to the sponges and some the com- 
plexities of the supports arose from the effort to shelter the cut- 
tings from the direct rays of the sun. So far as is known no 
practical use has been made of the methods developed by these 
long continued experiments. 
Concerning the first attempts to raise sponges artifically 
near Key West, we have very insufficient data. Sometime in 
the late seventies or early eighties, 216 cuttings were planted in 
a depth of about two and one-half feet of water, being fastened 
to the bottom by means of wires or sticks running through them. 
The cuttings were originally about two and one-half inches long 
and four specimens sent to the National Museum showed that as 
a result of six months growth they had increased to four-sixth 
times their original bulk. ‘This experiment was never pushed 
to a conclusion and the fate of the cuttings other than the four 
mentioned above is unknown. About twenty years later (1898 
circa) several thousand cuttings were planted at Sugar Loaf Key 
by Dr. J. V. Harris of Key West. They were attached to gal- 
vanized wire laid on the bottom in from two to four feet of 
water. ‘The mortality in these cuttings was very high and the 
wire soon corroded and broke in pieces. From time to time 
parts of this wire with a few sponges attached have been picked 
up. Growth appears to have been slow or, after a time, entirely 
arrested and the largest specimens seen by the writer have been 
under four inches in diameter with an age of three to five years. 
Exact data as to the age of any given specimen is not obtaina- 
ble. 
In January 1901, the Bureau of Fisheries began a series of 
experiments under the direction of the writer, at Sugar Loaf 
Key and at several places in Biscayne Bay where several thou- 
sand of cuttings were planted under a variety of environmental 
conditions and by a number of different methods. It was found, 
as all previous experimenters had found, that the commercial 
sponges are all more or less hardy and that they are but little 
