CXIII 



and prosperity to portions of the coast wMcIl were fast 

 becoming impoverished. 



The facility for working the oyster parks at low tide 

 in localities where there is a very great rise and fall of 

 tide, is more than neutralized by the costly arrangements 

 which must be devised for keeping them sufficiently 

 covered to prevent their exposure to destruction, which 

 V70uld be the result were they laid bare at critical peri- 

 ods ; yet, although oyster culture has hardly existed a 

 decade, the x^romises of success have been more fchan 

 realized, and results have been obtained by the employ- 

 ment of methods so simple, that the proprietor of any 

 oyster establishment will readily undertake to supply 

 millions of oysters to any one wishing to enter upon their 

 cultivation. 



When we have ascertained with precision the period 

 of attachment, when the spat forsakes its roving exis- 

 tence for a settled life, and have demonstrated that the 

 oyster can be produced in unlimited numbers and suc- 

 cessfully protected until this attachment is made, we will 

 have gone far beyond those methods which have pro- 

 duced such good results in European countries, and it 

 will be then necessary to take advantage of their experi- 

 ences for the determination of the best form of collectors 

 and the subsequent treatment of the oyster until it is 

 sent in a x)erfect state to market. 



It may, therefore, be more approx)riate to reserve for 

 a future report the details as to the form of collectors, 

 information which I obtained during a recent exam- 

 ination of the typical oyster cultural farms of France. 

 The determination of the form of collector best suited 

 for the several localities of the Chesapeake Bay must be 

 deterndned by actual experiment with the cliwplet^ (col- 

 lector formed of shells strung on galvanized wire,) the 

 favorite in tlie Bay of Arcachon ; the bouquet, (collector 

 formed of twelve tiles secured around a stake which hold 

 them in position,) a form much used in the neighborhood 



