368 
BULLETIN OE THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION 
III.— OYSTER-CULTURE AND ITS BRANCHES. 
French oyster-culturists are engaged either in collecting the young oysters ( pro- 
duction ) or in raising the seed for market ( elevage ). The eleveur buys his seed directly 
from the producer and is little interested in the question of dredged oysters. In our 
discussion, therefore, it will be most convenient to take up the processes in their 
regular order. We shall thus see, for example, how the swimming fry of the oyster 
becomes attached to the cement-coated collector, and how afterward, when the size of 
a finger-nail, the young oysters are separated and sold. Here begin the duties of the 
4leveur. He arranges the seed in wire-gauze growing cases till they are large enough 
to be little injured by enemies. He may then economize case room and transfer the 
oysters to inclosures fed daily by tidal water (parks). Or still further, the oysters may 
be specially fattened or given a desirable color by a sojourn in a shallow, long-stagnant 
pond (claire). These may finally secure a higher market price by processes of cleansing 
or of education for transport. 
PRODUCTION, OR THE RAISING OF SEED OYSTERS, AND KINDS OF COLLECTORS. 
Now that the supply of seed oysters along the Atlantic coast is becoming depleted 
by the increasing demand, the question of how the French have developed their industry 
practically without seed beds is of serious importance. If we have now to undertake 
artificial production on a large scale, we have evidently no need of repeating experi- 
ments already found fruitless. 
In France, ever since the time that de Bon showed how swimming oyster fry 
might be collected upon sticks and stones, every trial has been made of ways and 
means to produce the greatest number of seed oysters at the least expense. As col- 
lectors they have anchored bundles of brush, built platforms of wood, suspended 
strings of shells. The serious difficulty was always that the collectors would become 
speedily coated with slime or sediment, which would either stifle the young oyster or, 
at the best, prevent it from attaching. For this reason our method of simply scatter- 
ing broadcast over oyster-grounds shells or pebbles as collectors would in French 
localities prove of little value. It became evident, therefore, that a collector must be 
of a shape to render it least liable to become coated with sediment. This requisite 
was found in the roofing tile. 
A tile may be to us somewhat of a curiosity. One must imagine a shingle of 
brick so arched as to appear like the side of a tall flower pot, hollowed, therefore, on 
its under side. Its length is about 14 inches, its width 6 inches at one end and 5 at 
the other. Its arch is a slight one; the curve of one- fifth of a circle is found best 
adapted for purposes of collecting. It is this slight curve, however, that gives the 
tile its principal value in oyster-culture. Its under or hollow side becomes a recess 
almost free from sediment and may be crusted with spat, while the upper side is slime- 
coated and unproductive. 
