JAPANESE OYSTER-CULTURE. 
33 
storage. I may note in passing the curious “knife,” a combination of knife, mallet, 
ancl lever, with which oysters are opened with surprising rapidity. The modus 
operandi is shown in fig. 2, page 21. 
OYSTER-CULTURE AT NIHOJIMA. 
In this locality (cf. fig. 1), finally, oyster-culture has been developed on more 
special lines than anywhere else in the East. As at Kusatsu, the industry embraces 
three distinct branches — (a) spat collecting; ( b ) rearing the young, and (c) maturing 
and fattening the oysters for market. But, unlike at Kusatsu, these three branches 
of the industry are carried on, not on the same shore reach, but at points widely 
Pig. 25. — Ground plan of a mound toya of collectors. Sliibi with well-grown oysters are 
indicated by the black spots within the two circles of branching shibi. 
separate. In other words certain special tracts are taken advantage of in collecting 
spat; others are specially arranged for early rearing; others, in turn, for maturing. 
In these regards oyster-culture at Niliojima resembles closely that of the coast 
of Brittany or of Holland. The details of the management of the farms are in 
essentials, however, like those previously described. 
(a) Spat collecting . — The spat is collected in very shallow water, less than a 
fathom deep at the usual tides, tempered considerably by incoming streams. The 
specific gravity is said to rarely exceed 1.017. In such a region shibi are put in 
position, usually in very close order, at the beginning of each spawning season, say 
from the middle of April to the middle of May. After a period of about three 
months the entire mass of shibi will be uprooted and transplanted, sometimes a 
mile or more, to a locality better fitted for rearing the young oysters. This trans- 
portation, I was told, is the most difficult part of the work of the culturist of 
Niliojima, for the minute oysters are, as everywhere, peculiarly liable to injury; 
F. C. B. 1902—3 
