FRESH-WATER MUSSEIvS AND MUSSEIy INDUSTRIES. 6 1 



the export trade. It seems to be mere shortsightedness on the part of many shellers 

 that prevents the effective classifying of materials before sale. 



The shells are sometimes sold to local buyers or local factories; more often they 

 are bought by traveling buyers who may be agents of the larger factories or professional 

 shell merchants who buy in large quantities and sell as they find the most favorable 

 market. Some buyers maintain large power boats and barges (PI. XXXIII), which 

 may travel up and down the river, prepared to load the shells and convey them to a 

 convenient manufacturing or shipping point. The greater part of the shells are shipped 

 by rail in car shipments from the nearest freight station. At times and in some places 

 it has been the practice for shellers to operate small cutting plants, but the scheme has 

 not always worked well in practice. Each is a profession in itself, and the best cutting 

 is done by those who are practiced in cutting and shop management and who can keep 

 well advised as to the market demand for the various sizes and qualities of blanks. 



ELEMENTS OF WASTE. 



CULLS. 



The piles of culls are usually not large in proportion to the heaps of economic shells, 

 but they include a good many kinds of shells, worthless because of excessive thinness, 

 undesirable color, spotting, or other evident defect. Among such culls are the paper- 

 shells, the pink heel-splitter, black sand-shells of pink nacre, purple warty-backs, and 

 often the purple or salmon-colored elephant's ears and spikes. The last-mentioned can 

 be used for making smoked-pearl buttons, although they are not usually in demand. 

 It sometimes happens, therefore, that at the close of the season a buyer will take the 

 usable colored shells at a reduced price. The tendency of shellers to throw in all off- 

 colored shells has given unfortunate discouragement to this practice. 



MEATS. 



In connection with the shells collected each year, there are taken some 10,000 tons 

 of wet meats for which there is no appropriate use. Small quantities are sold locally for 

 use as fish bait with trot-lines, or hoop nets, or as food for poultry or pigs. The fresh 

 meats, after being allowed to sour in the sun, are considered particularly good for these 

 purposes; but generally only a small proportion of the meats has been so used. It is 

 often a serious question in the mussel camp to make proper disposal of this material. 

 The meats that can not be sold locally are often dumped into the river, buried in the 

 ground, or put into a "rot box." The throwing of meats into the river in large quantities 

 becomes objectionable when those that are not eaten by the fish and turtles rise to the 

 surface in a state of decomposition and are washed ashore to cause an offensive stench in 

 the neighborhood of the camps. 



The meats, when dried in the sun or by the use of artificial heat, can be ground to 

 make a fine meal, in which condition they appear to keep indefinitely. For the purpose 

 of sun-drying they are spread on frames made of coarse-mesh wire screen so arranged that 

 the air can circulate freely between them. In dry, sunny weather the meats can be 

 dried in from 30 to 72 hours to about five-eighths of their wet weight. When so dried, 

 they can be ground in a coffee mill or similar machine; but the foot part becomes 

 exceedingly hard and tough when partially dried and rapidly wears out the mill. Since 

 the meats are usually too large to feed into the coffee mill whole, they should be reduced 



