JAPANESE OYSTER-CULTURE. 
By BASHFORD DEAN, 
Adjunct Professor in Zoology , Columbia University. 
European oyster-culture, especially as practiced in France and Holland, is gen- 
erally regarded as the most refined development of this ancient art; and from our 
knowledge of this — if we admit that those cultural methods are the most perfect which 
produce the greatest number of oysters in a given area — we can reasonably conclude 
that some of the devices at least of the European culturist will ultimately come to 
be adopted in our own system. In view, accordingly, of the prospective value of 
foreign methods in the development of American oyster-culture, the United States 
Commission of Fish and Fisheries has already published (in its bulletins® for 1890 
and 1891) reports upon the practical workings of the best forms of European oyster 
parks. From the character of the methods there in use, we can, I believe, conclude 
positively that similar establishments could be operated successfully at suitable 
points — e. g., in Chesapeake Bay or Long Island waters, as soon, that is, as the 
demand for oysters will warrant the use of what will prove at first a more expensive 
system. 
While these European methods are applicable on our Atlantic coast, it still 
remains to be determined whether they include the best that could be employed 
along the Pacific, should artificial oyster-culture be here attempted. For in these 
waters different conditions have produced oysters which differ widely from those of 
the North Atlantic. The Pacific culturist may therefore feel a more lively interest 
in the oysters of Japan, for not merely are they closer akin to his own, in structure 
and in habitat, and therefore more readily acclimatable, but they are larger, better 
shaped, and certainly of greater value, commercially speaking, than the local product, 
Ostreci calif ornica. Moreover, the Japanese oysters have long been cultivated, and 
with great success. Indeed, by some experts the Japanese methods have been 
commended as the simplest and most practicable of all forms of ‘ ‘ ai’tificial ” oyster 
culture, and thus of possible interest in somewhat broader lines. 
Unfortunately there is no literature accessible dealing in detail with the culture 
or living conditions of this western Pacific oyster, and it is witli the aim of filling 
this gap that the present report was prepared. Its material was collected by the 
writer during a stay in Japan in 1900-1901. He there acted under special instructions 
from Commissioner George M. Bowers, and in aid of his inquiries Avas designated as 
a biologist of the United States Commission of Fish and Fisheries. 
« Report on the Present Methods of Oyster-culture in Prance. Bulletin XJ. S. Commission of Pish and Fisheries, 
1890, pages 363-388, plates LXVIII-LXXVIII. 
Report on the European Methods of Oyster-culture. Op. cit. for 1891, pages 357-406, plates LXXV-LXXXVIII. 
(Italy, Spain, Portugal, Germany, Holland, Belgium, and England.) 
17 
P. C. B. 1902—2 
