122 THE SCALLOP FISHERY 



tend to make scallops no longer a luxury but a part of the common 

 diet. However, the fisherman need have no fears in this direction, as 

 investigation has shown that there can be no great increase in the scallop 

 supply, although many of the poor years can be avoided by proper 

 foresight and by work along the lines here suggested. 



The reason that the scallop supply can never be successfully increased 

 is due, (1) to no practical means of artificial culture; (2) it was found 

 by this department that money expended in propagating the embryos 

 and young at the present time would be wasted, for the destructive 

 agencies enumerated i^i chapter IV. would defeat any increase of the 

 supply through successive years, one bad season undoing the work of 

 several years and entaUing a new start. If a severe winter killed all 

 the spawning scallops in one locality, there would be the same scarcity 

 of spawn, no matter how great the number of scallops. If such disas- 

 ters were of rare occurrence the effect would not be so important, but 

 destruction often occurs upon the shallow flats. Thus, under natural 

 conditions there seems a maximum and minimum point of variation 

 between which the scallop supply is constantly wavering. The supply 

 can be somewhat increased and conditions improved by judicious trans- 

 planting from the exposed places, thus eliminating the adverse con- 

 ditions. 



(a) Artificial Propagation. — Artificial propagation may be of two 

 kinds: (1) raising the young from the eggs; (2) catching the spat. So 

 far our experiments have indicated that it is impossible to raise the 

 young embryos in suflScient numbers for commercial hatching. Un- 

 doubtedly some benefit would result from the artificial fertilization of 

 the eggs and the liberation of the young larvae when they first begin to 

 swim, as in nature there is a great loss through non-fertilization. But 

 such a result is purely theoretical, as there is no way of determining 

 the loss when the spawn is liberated. When kept in hatching tubs the 

 majority die before they attain the shell stage. So far this method has 

 proved unsatisfactory, and it is hardly believed that it can be put on a 

 practical basis. 



Spat collecting has already been considered under chapter IV., and it 

 onlj' is necessary here to state that for practical work spat collecting 

 does not pay, as greater quantities of scallops can be obtained when 

 small from the eel-grass flats than could be caught with extensive spat- 

 collecting apparatus. Looking at it in one way the scallop supply 

 would be increased so much by the scallops taken on the collectors, 

 as they probably would not survive to set elsewhere, but such would 

 be a " penny wise and pound foolish " method for the planter. If a 

 scallop culturist found it impossible to obtain " seed " it might pay him 

 to try spat collecting. This would only occur in rare instances, where 

 scallops were not plentiful. 



( b ) Artificial Culture. — The question of raising scallops artificially 

 for the market, and thus increasing the general supply, was one of the 



