252 LITTLE FOLKS 
OYSTER FARMS. 
How do you like the idea of Oyster Farms, where if you wanted 
a dish of Oysters, you would only have to go out and pick them as 
you do apples? You country children, I mean, for as far as city 
children know by experience, apples grow in barrels. 
Shall I tell you how these droll farms came to be started? 
This was the way : Men ate so many Oysters that they began to be 
quite scarce in some places, and people feared that we would drain 
the sea, so some enterprising men set themselves to work to culti- 
vate them, as we do potatoes — only in a different way. 
When the little Oyster is launched into life to take care of 
himself, his first care is to secure a home. His ideas are very 
simple, being merely a holding on place. Holding on is the 
specialty of an Oyster. If he cannot at once secure a safe home, 
he is almost sure to be devoured by fishes, for those slippery crea- 
tures are as fond of Oysters as you are. 
As soon as the wise men found this out about the baby Oyster, 
they thought of the idea of providing homes for the little creatures, 
and they made some nurseries in this way: They drove strong 
stakes into the mud — under water, of course — and between the 
stakes wove branches of trees. That was all. 
Having the nursery ready, the men next brought several boat 
loads of old Oysters and placed them on the ground around the 
stakes, to start the farm. As the young Oysters were hatched, 
they naturally attached themselves to the branches, and proceeded 
at once to grow. Each Mother Oyster is said to lay two millions 
of eggs in a season. 
There are other ways of arranging Oyster farms. One in use 
in Italy, where a small lake is — or was —devoted to the purpose, is 
to build a small hill of stones and make a sort of fence around it 
with stakes. 
The old Oysters live on the hill, and the young ones on the 
stakes. All the farmer has to do when he wants Oysters is to pull 
up a stake, and pick them off. Here is a picture of a whole family, 
— from the tiny bits of babies down in the corner, to nearly grown 
up children. 
In France there is a different way. The farms are enclosed 
