78 OYSTER BEDS OF JAMES RIVER, VIRGINIA. 
A considerable proportion of these oysters could not be profitably 
removed from the beds, being either too sparsely distributed in the 
first place or constituting a necessary remnant which would become 
too scattered after tonging had been carried on for a period on bot- 
toms of greater initial productiveness. To show the estimated 
maximum possible yield of the beds during the present season the 
following table has been prepared, covering the entire area of seed 
beds in the James River: 
Summary of Available Content of Oysters on Seed Areas. 
Name of ground. 
Dense. 
Scatter- 
ing. 
Very scat- 
tering. 
Total. 
Warwick No. 1 (above Deep Creek) 
Isle of Wight No. 1 
Bushels. 
569, 100 
9,000 
Bushels. 
59,900 
Bushels. 
21,500 
70 
Bushels. 
650,500 
9,070 
Total 
578,100 
232 
87.7 
59,900 
53 
9.1 
21,570 
25 
3.2 
650,570 
Average per acre 
Per cent 
100.0 
In preparing the data on which this table is based it has been 
assumed that the seed will bring 30 cents per bushel and that no 
bottom can be considered productive when its yield is reduced below 4 
bushels per day of actual tonging, excluding the time occupied in 
culling. As in the preceding pages of this report, the probable yield 
is based on the density of the oyster growth and the depth of water on 
the several parts of each bed. 
Although the data employed differs somewhat from that used in 
the discussion of the bottoms below Deep Creek, owing to the lower 
price brought by seed as compared with market oysters, the financial 
return to the tonger from the bottoms designated as respectively 
dense, scattering, and very scattering is essentially the same. The 
minimum yield assumed to place a given area above the grade of 
depleted bottom is valued at $1.20 per day at the prices recently pre- 
vailing, -and this can not be regarded as other than an extreme mini- 
mum, because, when the number of idle days is taken into considera- 
tion, a tonger could not afford to work for such low wages. The 
limit is justifiable only in consideration of the fact that before the 
dense and scattering areas are reduced to a level so low they will have 
yielded to the tonger an average daily wage much in excess of this. 
If the price of oysters falls below 30 cents per bushel, it will not be 
profitable to work the beds so closely as was contemplated in the 
preparation of the above table. At the prices reported as current 
on the James River in November, 1909, namely, 20 cents per bushel 
for seed, the estimated catch on the area of very scattering growth 
may be eliminated, that on the scattering bottom reduced by at least 
50 per cent and on the dense areas by about 15 per cent, lowering the 
