REPOET OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. LXIII 
Brenton’s Beef light-ship to a point opposite the north end of Prudence 
Island, which demonstrated that at this season of the year the salinity 
of the water in this passageway continued hearly uniform at all times 
of the tide. Between the North Point of Prudence Island and the 
mouth of Providence Biver, the examination was made in much greater 
detail and showed that while at the bottom the densities varied only 
slightly with the tides, at the surface the changes are more percepti- 
ble. Within this area the bottom is mostly covered with a thick layer 
of mud ; no natural oyster beds exist, but a planted bed of about 8 
acres in extent is located to the south of Conimicut Point. Starfishes 
were found to be abundant on a small mussel bed lying to the south of 
Nay at Point, but only a few were taken in the dredgings elsewhere.. 
Plottings were made of the larger and more productive beds in 
Providence Biver, the same being based upon the surveys of the 
Fish Raich, with additional information furnished by the oystermen. 
A comparison of this work with the State oyster map of 1880 shows 
that a large area of oyster bottom has been abandoned within the past 
eight years, but its extent was not determined. The set of spat, more- 
over, was inconsiderable during that period, and the planters have been 
obliged to obtain their seed chiefly from Connecticut and other waters. 
The oysters raised about Bullock Point and in its vicinity are consid- 
ered the finest in the river. The beds nearest the river channel suffer 
more or less from the depredations of starfishes, which do not reach the 
inner beds, the latter, however, being subject to the attacks of drills 
and periwinkles. Off* Sabine Point there is also a good oyster bed, 
which is not troubled by starfishes except to a very slight extent along 
its outer edge. Great Bed, so called, was once regarded as one of the 
best pieces of oyster bottom in the river, but since the freshet of 1886, 
when it was covered with mud, itha& greatly deteriorated, and most of 
the leases have been canceled. A few small patches of oysters occur 
between Gaspe Point and Pawtuxent Beach, but drills and periwinkles 
are so abundant upon them and have been so destructive that the 
present owners propose to relinquish their claims. The Fish Hawh 
found starfishes most plentiful on a bed of 100 acres just to the north 
of Nay at Point, where, it was estimated, they had already destroyed 
about one half of its crop of two-year-old oysters. The greatest amount 
of damage observed, however, had been done by the drills. The beds 
about Field’s Point and in Bullock’s Cove, formerly said to have been 
the most productive in the river, were in a very bad condition, due to 
their inroads. Large quantities of oyster shells, one, two, and three 
years old, with scarcely a living specimen among them, were fre- 
quently brought up in the dredges. Over a large proportion of these 
grounds fully 95 per cent of the oysters had been killed in this manner. 
One owner estimates his loss of seed oysters during 1887 and 1888 at 
40,000 bushels, worth 40 cents a bushel, his entire stock having practb 
cally been wiped out, 
