356 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND ‘FISHERIES. 
could be protected from the heavy waves by some firm outside barrier, 
and be covered with an abundance of large shells not so likely to drift, 
a permanent bed might readily be formed. The eastern oysters laid 
out on the natural shellbanks in some places are frequently rolled 
along the bed and washed high and dry upon the beaches. The original 
bedding-grounds along the east side of the bay have been abandoned 
mainly on this account. 
It is possible that I have not attached sufficient importance to the 
evil of overcrowding by the remarkably fertile native species, This 
little oyster, naturally adapted to these places, finds the large shell of 
the eastern gaa a fixing: surhice 2 ee adapted to its needs. it 
Saniaee of te Matar suniiiakee it nee the advantage of the prota 
tion of the fences; it is nearer to the muddy bottom, from which much 
of its food is derived, and yet is lifted by the shell of the large oyster 
to a safe height above that bottom, where the under shells of a cluster 
of any species of oyster would be smothered in the mud. So closely 
do these indigenous oysters crowd upon the shells of the large species 
that when a heap of the latterhave been tléaned for market the accu- 
mulated parasites almost equal in bulk the edible species. Doubtless 
they are responsible for crowding many of the young of the less adap- 
tive eastern species completely out of existence, een 
The native oyster (O. lurida) grows twice as large at Willapa Bay, 
Washington, as it does at San Francisco, and is constantly misnamed 
the “California oyster.” But no use is made of the small California 
coast oyster, except as its shells are utilized in the ways previously 
mentioned. 
The Morgan Oyster Company.—This company now maintains six 
important stations or groups of oyster beds in San Francisco Bay, 
where oysters imported from the Atlantic coast are kept until they 
reach a marketable size. All are situated in the southern part of the 
bay, and are from 15 to 35 miles back from the Golden Gate. At each 
of these localities there is a comfortable building for housing the 
employés. Each station is supplied with fresh water by an artesian 
well, which usually elevates the water a few feet above high tide, 
windmills being added at three of the stations to raise the water to 
tanks. At four stations (Dumbarton, San Bruno, Millbrae, and Alva- 
obi the last now abandoned) the houses are built upon piles, and are 
1 or 2 miles from the nearest land.. At the other stations they are upon 
islands or the shores of the bay. There are several inclosed oyster 
beds near each of the houses, varying in extent from 50 to 100 acres 
each. I had no means of knowing the actual extent of the oyster beds 
of this company, but will roughly estimate the territory fenced in by 
stakes at 1,500 or 2,000 acres. This should, perhaps, be regarded as a 
guess rather than as an estimate. 
nn ame 
OO 
