238 
BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 
experiments bear out this point. In as short a time as one year, under favorable 
conditions, the cuttings will attain a marketable size, and certainly within sixteen or 
eighteen months the harvesting of relatively large sponges may be depended on. 
These results are in marked contrast to those in the Adriatic, where the rate of 
growth was so exceedingly slow as to seriously militate against the feasibility of 
sponge propagation in those waters. The person in charge of the experiments states 
that “the clippings grow two or three times their original size during the first year,” 
and that, “although some pieces will grow to a considerable size in five years, it will 
require seven years to raise completely matured sponges which are fit to become an 
article of merchandise.” A writer who reviewed the experiments very pertinently 
remarked: 
The profitableness of sponge-culture would be far more evident if there was not such a long 
interval between planting and harvesting; in other words, if the sponges would grow more rapidly. 
This was certainly looked for when the enterprise was started; but it is dispiriting to have to wait 
for your crop for seven long years. 
The attitude of the State toward the project to increase the supply of sponges 
by artificial means must necessarily exert considerable influence on its success. 
Adequate encouragement and authority should be given by the Commonwealth to 
those desiring to engage in this enterprise, to be supplemented by ample protection 
from poachers after grounds have been planted. 
Artificial sponge-grounds are susceptible of the same methods of regulation that 
have proved of value in the case of the oyster. The State might levy a tax, which 
would defray the expenses incurred in protecting the growers, but if such action is 
calculated to discourage the business it should not be broached until the industry has 
been placed on a substantial footing. 
The area of barren bottom which one person may be allowed to appropriate should 
be limited, so that no monoply will be created and the undertaking of the enterprise 
by numerous small planters be encouraged. The project is popular with many of the 
persons already interested in the sponge industry. Some, however, have expressed 
the fear that the best planting-grounds will fall into the hands of a few persons, who 
may in time secure control of the industry. The fear also exists among some of the 
sponge fishermen that extensive planting may deprive them of a livelihood, but there 
is little or no basis for such apprehension. Sponge-planting will give employment to 
many additional persons, aud probably will indirectly prove of benefit to those who 
sponge on the natural grounds, by diverting some attentiou therefrom and permitting 
a larger growth thereon. 
PROPOSED INTRODUCTION OF MEDITERRANEAN SPONGES. 
While for general purposes there is no better sponge than the Florida sheepswool, 
some of the foreign sponges, used in surgical practice and in other special branches, 
are more delicate, and yield a much higher price per pound than any native species. 
Some of the small Levant toilet sponges bring as much as $50 a pound, and the con- 
sumption of these high priced sponges in the United States is quite large. 
The possibility of transplanting in our own waters some of the best of the foreign 
sponges, in order that our own fishermen may reap the benefits of the high prices, 
opens up a very interesting subject. It has been thought that a very small colony, 
properly nurtured, would, under favorable conditions, form a nucleus from which a 
