Shell-fish industries

Preface

It was suggested to me that I should try to prepare this account of our food molkisks for three groups of persons, namely, those who eat them, those who may be or desire to become directly interested in their culture, and those who may have an interest in the biological problems involved in their artificial control. This suggestion I adopted, and many times since have wondered at the recklessness of my courage in attempting a performance of so varied a character. I recall vividly the impression made on my youthful mind years ago on witnessing the evolutions of three beautifully matched horses and the graceful feat of James Robinson in riding them around a ring. Though in my wildest childhood imaginings I never dreamed of attempting or desired to attempt so skilful an act, I have in the last months, at a period of life hat should conventionally be characterized at least by sedateness, experienced the disquieting sensation of having actually attempted much the same kind of a performance in thus endeavoring to present several topics that might hold the attention of readers possessing widely different interests. While desiring to exhibit these subjects so as to bring out their most interesting features, I, of course, have been compelled to present them for brief intervals one at a time, thus always giving two-thirds of my readers an opportunity to yawn. If, however, it should happen that the other third is interested, I shall be amply paid for my effort.

iv Preface

While the first three chapters, that deal with some anatomical, developmental, and physiological facts, may require closer attention than some of the others, they are designed in part to make clearer several subjects treated subsequently. That on anatomy has been made as simple as possible, and the illustrations are new. The short account of a few ciliary mechanisms in the third chapter is from my own observations, and previously I have published only those on Venus. It may be that even the small part of my cilia work here presented will be of some interest to biologists, for the subject itself is practically new.

A relatively large amount of attention has, of course, been given to the oyster. My own interest in the form began nearly twenty years ago, my attention being directed to it by the late Professor W. K. Brooks, the great naturalist and great teacher, who will always be remembered in Maryland as the father of oyster culture. My first efforts, made together with another of Dr. Brooks' pupils, were directed toward a solution of the problem of rearing the swimming embryo in small inclosures to the stage in which it became attached, and in spite of the ingenuity of my friend, we failed dismally. For that reason I write with some feeling the chapter on rearing the oyster from the egg. I may perhaps be allowed to state that from many wanderings along our coast, I have been enabled to gain a more or less extensive personal knowledge of oyster culture and familiarity with parts of the oyster field described. It has seemed to me that the person who eats oysters — and who does not? — might be interested not merely in the manner of their production and preparation for market, some descriptions of which have appeared, but also in the oyster

Preface v

fields on our shores, no connected account of which has been pubHshed so far as I know. So I have given considerable space to the history and present condition of our oyster territory, and have ventured some suggestions concerning its future development.

The chapters on the life history of the soft clam, Mya, the conditions governing its growth, and on clam culture, constitute an account of my own work begun in 1898 at a time when practically nothing was known concerning the biology of the form except through analogy. This work was suggested by Dr. H. C. Bumpus, now Director of the American Museum of Natural History of New York, for the United States Fish Commission. In Rhode Island, successful experiments on the growth of Mya have also been carried on by Professor A. D. Mead. The short account of the growth of the hard clam, Venus, is also from observations that I published in 1903. Several facts concerning the life histories and growth of the soft clam, hard clam, and scallop have been supplied by my friend and former pupil, Mr. D. L. Belding, Biologist of the Massachusetts Fish and Game Commission, who has had these forms continually under observation since 1905, and who has experimented on a very large scale. Some of these facts Mr. Belding has not yet published. Some observations by Mr. J. R. Stevenson, another of my pupils, have been quoted.

The attempt has been made to present the great possibilities of clam culture, and to call attention to legislative changes that are necessary to inaugurate it. Biological knowledge assuring its success is at hand, while many thousands of acres in New England entirely adapted to it now lie barren and unproductive. It would be fortunate if by some means there might be extended to other parts vi Preface

of the country, where these forms are now unknown in the markets, a knowledge of their great value as food mollusks, for our entire coast line is capable of producing either the soft or the hard clam.

Mr. Roosevelt uttered a great truth when he stated that the most important problem confronting the nation is the conservation of its natural resources; and the wonderful awakening of the people to that truth, for which he more than any other person is responsible, is one of the most important events that has occurred in America during a century of waste and extravagance. An attempt has here been made to show that even the resources of the " great and wide sea, wherein are things creeping innumerable," are very far from being inexhaustible, as many seem to imagine ; but also that some of its useful forms may, by directing the processes of nature that are at the same time productive of so great bounty and so great waste, not only be conserved, but made to produce even on waste places greater harvests than ever before existed.

Acknowledgment for the use of figures is gratefully made to the United States Bureau of Fisheries, to various state fish commissions, to the Johns Hopkins University Press, and to the American Museum of Natural History of New York. All but one of the text figures are my own, and, with a few obvious exceptions, are drawn from my own preparations.

WiLLIAMSTOWN, MaSS.,

January, 1910.

Chapter I SEA FARMING FACE

A national inventory of resources — Waste by earlier generations — Extinction of undomesticated food organisms inevitable — Achievements in the domestication of terrestrial animals and plants — Sea farming — What has been accomplished — What may be hoped for I

Chapter II NOTES ON THE ANATOMY OF THE FOOD MOLLUSKS

The shell — Its parts — Pearls — Attachment of the oyster — The mantle — The digestive tract — The palps or lips — Mouth, stomach, and intestine — The vascular system — The heart — The excretory organs — Sexual organs — Hermaphroditism — The nervous system — The foot — Creeping, digging, and spinning the byssus — Swimming by means of the foot — Structure of the gills of Mytilus, Pecten, and Ostrea . Ii

Chapter III

Structure of the male and female cells — Preparation of the ovum for fertilization — Fertilization — Segmentation — Formation of organs — Attachment 39

Chapter IV

The food of bivalves — The normal process of feeding — The gills as food collectors — Transfer of food to the mouth by gills and palps — The mud problem and its solution — Cilia tracts on the mantle of Venus leading backward in the mantle chamber — How mud is discharged from viii Contents the mantle chamber — Cilia tracts on the side of the visceral mass — Mud collected by the gills — The palps organs for determining whether collected material shall be carried to the mouth or away from it — Ciliation of organs of the oyster — Selection or rejection of material determined by its volume — Experiments — Automatic selection of food by the gills of Pecten — Special organs for the rejection of mud in Pholas

> Chapter V

Ancient shell heaps — Oyster culture in antiquity — European flat and Portuguese oysters — Destruction of natural oyster beds in Europe — Scientific experiments of M. de Bon and M. Coste — Great initial success of oyster culture in France — Early disaster to the industry — Ignorance of the biological factors involved — Revival of the industry — Spat collectors — The breeding season — Caring for the growing oysters — Oyster culture between tide lines — Oyster parks and their construction — Racks for the young — The " greening " of oysters — Final preparation for market — Japanese oysters — The use of bamboo collectors — Growth of the young

Chapter VI CONDITIONS GOVERNING OYSTER GROWTH —OYSTER PLANTING IN AMERICA

Why European methods will not be employed in America — How American is different from European oyster culture — Biological conditions governing oyster growth — Bottom to be selected for oyster culture — Food requirements — The effect of a variable salinity — Oyster planting — " Seed " oysters — Time required for growth — The amount of seed to be planted— Method of planting the seed — Gathering the seed — Natural beds as sources of seed — Former use of Chesapeake seed in the North — Irregularity of the set in northern waters ....

Chapter VII

A method of artificial fertilization of oyster eggs— Widespread interest in the discovery of Professor Brooks — Impracticable modifications of the method by others —

Contents ix

Origin of the belief that artificial fertilization might simplify oyster culture — Persistence of this hope to the present time — Liberated embryos gathered on collectors in France — Experiments in America — Oyster and clam culture have nothing to gain from artificial fertilization of the egg 109

Chapter VIII

True oyster culture not extensively practised — Advantages from the capture of seed on collectors — Collectors employed in America — When collectors or " cultch " should be spread — Slime — Care of growing oysters — Labor necessary for success — Varying methods in different fields — Nature of the labor of the northern culturist . 118

Chapter IX IMPLEMENTS AND THEIR USES— BOATS

THE PREPARATION OF OYSTERS

FOR MARKET

Tongs and their uses — Nippers — Patent tongs — The use of dredges — Opposition to the use of the dredge — Form and sizes of dredges — Hand and steam windlasses for drawing dredges — Boats — Tonging boats — Schooner rigged vessels — The lugger — Steam vessels — The " Early Bird " — Increase in the number of steam vessels — A demonstration of the superiority of steam power — Preparing oysters for market — Cleaning and culling — The freshening of oysters — Bad features of the practice — The matter of taste and the flavor of oysters — " Shucking " — Washing the " meats " — Containers, tin cans, barrels, pails, bottles — Shipping — Steamed oysters 129

Chapter X NATURAL ENEMIES OF THE AMERICAN OYSTER

The starfish in the north Atlantic — First recognized as a dangerous oyster enemy in 1882 — Structure — Its migrations — Its food — How the starfish opens an oyster or clam — Removal of starfish from oyster beds by means of tangles — The oyster drill — Formerly not numerous — The drumfish — Sheepshead — Rays and skates — Crabs — The oyster crab — Mussels — The boring sponge — The boring clam — Sea-weeds and hydroids — Oyster diseases . . . 147

X Contents

Chapter XI BIVALVES IN RELATION TO DISEASE PAGE

Typhoid fever — Sources of infection — Contamination of water over oyster or clam beds — How bivalves strain disease organisms from large quantities of sea water- Need of caution in eating uncooked bivalves — Danger in the freshening process — How it may be prevented — Safety rests largely on the demands of the consumer . i66

Chapter XII THE NORTHERN OYSTER FIELD— HISTORICAL

Natural oyster beds north of Cape Cod — Kitchen middens in north New England — The Damariscotta shell heap — Historical records — Why natural oyster beds have disappeared — Early extent of natural beds in New England and New York — Cause of the depletion of the natural beds — The beginnings of oyster culture in America — Early laws governing the oyster industry — Lease and sale of bottoms — The fear of monopolies — The futility of the close season 174

Chapter XIII PRESENT CONDITIONS IN THE NORTHERN FIELD

American and European oysters compared — The use of southern seed — Oyster laws — The old method of local control — The new method — Surveys of barren bottoms as well as of natural beds — Definition of a natural bed — Incontestible titles and the settlement of disputes — Other features of present Connecticut oyster laws — Direct revenue plan not in favor — Activities on Long Island Sound — Deep water culture — Mergers — Monopoly — Work during the summer — Northern markets 186

Chapter XIV

Historical — Record of the oyster industry fragmentary — Origin of the present packing business in Maryland — In Virginia — Estimated production of the Chesapeake in half a century — Belief that the supply was inexhaustible — Special Maryland Oyster Commission of 1882 — Report of Professor Brooks — Destruction of the natural beds by excessive dredging — Record of the decline of the in-

Contents xi dustry — Production in Virginia exceeds that of Maryland — The Chesapeake oyster in politics — Laws not enforced—Oyster pirates and their raids— Oyster culture impossible— How the crews of the pirate vessels were recruited — Their treatment by dredging captains — Present and future of the Chesapeake industry — Ineffectual policing by " oyster navies " — No surveys of barren bottoms —Natural beds still the chief source of the supply— Planting on the increase — Features of Maryland's oyster laws of 1906 — Survey of the natural beds by the new Oyster Commission — Criticism of the new law 206

Chapter XV THE NORTH CAROLINA FIELD

Physical characters of the region — Oyster reefs — How oysters form islands — Why natural oyster beds do not appear between tide lines in the northern field as in the Carolinas — Why, in North Carolina, natural beds seldom form below the low tide line — Oyster clusters — " Raccoon " oysters and how they are formed — Small oysters from clusters available for seed — Formation of river tonging beds — Possibilities of oyster culture in Pamlico Sound — Extension of natural beds — The appearance of the Baltimore dredgers — Destruction of the natural beds Dredging by non-residents prohibited — Cull laws not enforced — The future of the industry in North Carolina . 229

Chapter XVI THE GULF OF MEXICO

Florida — Natural beds between and below tide lines — Laws — Alabama — Mississippi — Rapid development of the industry in Louisiana — Subsidence of the shore line — Great area available for oyster culture — Nature of the coast east of the Mississippi River — Chandeleur Islands and Sound — Rapid growth of oyster culture west of the delta — Silt deposit — Experiments showing that the softest of bottoms may be reclaimed — Great deposits of small shells — Ideal collectors — Rapid rate of oyster growth— Oyster enemies — Destructiveness of floods from the Mississippi — Advantages in the conditions in- Louisiana — Wise laws — Production rapidly increasing — Texas — Natural beds — Prospect for the future 251

Chapter XVII

The native Pacific oyster— Atlantic animals introduced into the Pacific — Planting the native oyster in Washington — xii Contents

Depletion of the natural beds in Puget Sound — Introduction of the Atlantic oyster in San Francisco and Willapa bays — Failure of reproduction — Low temperature — Acclimatization — Stock companies for rearing oysters in Washington 269

Chapter XVIII THE SOFT CLAM— DISTRIBUTION AND CONDITIONS CONTROLLING IT

Former abundance in New England — Present scarcity — Vernacular and " scientific " names — Character of clam bottoms — Digging clams — Action of disturbed clams — Conditions necessary for the growth of Mya— Effect of a shifting bottom — A tenacious soil necessary — Clay, a growth of algEe thatch — Water currents and the food supply — Effect of close segregation — Good effects of digging — Great variation in salinity not harmful — Enemies few 276

Chapter XIX

The breeding season — Destruction of the swimming young — Settling to the bottom — The byssus — Attachment and its purposes — The creeping period and its dangers — Destruction by small starfish — Beginning of the burrowing habit — Byssus attachment in the burrow and its purpose — Atrophy of the byssus — Final descent into the ground

Chapter XX THE GROWTH OF THE SOFT CLAM AND SOME NOTES ON CLAM CULTURE

First experiments on the growth of Mya — The plan followed — Determination of the amount of growth — Specific example — Table showing growth of planted clams — Experiments by the Massachusetts Fish and Game Commission — Early attempts at clam culture — The Bridgeport experiment — Towns allowed to rent flats — The Essex experiment — Peculiarities of the clam set — Immense segregations and their causes — Sources of seed for planting — How seed clams may be planted — Amount of seed to be used — Barren flats available in Massachusetts — Public and private ownership of clam shores — Present absurd laws— Advantages of clam culture not possessed

Contents xiii by oyster culture — Introduction of Mya into California and Washington — Its rapid development — Native clams of the Pacific coast 298

Chapter XXI

Names — Methods of capture — Marketing — Decreases in number — Development — First experiments on growth — Creeping — Effect of sea-weed over beds — No growth in New England during the winter — Value of a strong current — Wide variation in salinity possible — Few natural enemies — Demand for the " little neck " — Culture methods not encouraged — Monopoly and destruction of the industry by shore towns in New England — Need of legislation — Obtaining seed — Planting on Long Island — Possibilities in hard clam culture 321

Chapter XXII

Only the adductor muscle used for food — Freshening or bloating by marketmen — Names — Two Atlantic species used for food — Distribution — Eyes — Swimming habits — The warm water scallop apparently does not migrate — Method of capture — Decrease in number — Development — Swimming by the foot — Spinning the byssus — Bearing of byssus attachment on distribution — The creeping stage in bivalves — Rate of growth depends on food-bearing currents — Growth ceases in winter — Actual rate of growth — Normal length of life — Its economic bearing — Biological problem involved — How to determine whether a scallop has spawned — Economic waste in not dredging individuals that have spawned — Legislation needed — Enemies — Results of scallop culture doubtful — Waste of food in America — Failure to utilize marine food mollusks and fishes — The inhabitants of the sea not all beyond human control 333

Index 353

LIST OF PLATES

FACING PAGE

Anatomy of the Round Clam or " Little Neck " . . . 12

Anatomy of the Oyster . . . ' 24-

The Development of the American Oyster .... 44 Tile Collectors in Place on a Tidal Flat at Auray, France 82 Arcachon, France. Oyster Parks with Low Clay Walls 82 Arcvchon. Parks with Somewhat Higher Walls Containing Cases for the Growing Young 82

Newly Arranged Collectors of Bamboo on a Tidal Flat

IN Japan 88

Oyster Park or Growing Ground in Japan .... 88

Objects to Which Small Oysters Have Attached . . . 120 An Iron Mast Hoop from Chesapeake Bay Covered by

Thousands of Oysters of Various Sizes .... 120

A Fleet of Gasoline Tonging Boats in Hampton Roads, Va. 130

Tongers and Cullers at Work on Pamlico Sound, N. C. . 130 A North Carolina Dredging Schooner, Showing Dredge

and Hand Windlass 134

Drawing a More Modern Dredge by Steam Power on the

New York Oyster Grounds 134

Steam Dredging Vessel on Long Island Sound .... 136

Steam Dredging Vessel Owned at New Haven .... 136

New York Steam Dredging Vessel Towing the Dredges . 136 A Powerful Ice-breaking Steamer Owned at New Haven,

Conn 140

The Largest of the Northern Oyster Fleet .... 140

Oyster Cluster Covered with Mussels 162

The Nature of the Crowding in Oyster Clusters . . . 162 Laboratory Employees Tonging and Culling Clustered

Oysters in Louisiana 232

XV xvi List of Plates

FACING PAGE

Natural Growth of " Coon Oyster " Clusters Between

Tide Lines in South Carolina 232

Shells of Arca with Young Oysters Attached . . . 262 Single Oysters Attached to Shells of a Small Clam . . 262 Holes of Long-neck Clams Very Thickly Set in a Beach 282 Long-neck Clams Dug from Beneath One Square Foot of

a Flat . , 282

Increase in Size in One Year of Clam One Inch Long

When Planted 304

Increase in Volume in One Year of Clams in an Experimental Bed with Slight Current 304

Box Suspended from a Raft Near a Clam Flat from

May 15 Until October 15 of the Same Year . . . 312 Growth of Mya in Two Years on i-ioo of an Acre of a Barren Flat 312

Chapter I

F one were to construct a classification of the units of society, he could perhaps most conveniently group them as pessimists and optimists. It is difficult to determine which is the larger group. One is apt to say in his haste that all men are pessimists. Whether this really is true or not, chronic fault-finders certainly are not rare, and all know where to look for the glowing face of the optimist. Every one knows the cheerful friend who, while urging one to go fishing with him, would turn his back on the black cloud rising in the southwest and call attention to the little patch of blue remaining in the east to prove the impossibility of rain. On large matters of national interest, as well as in small affairs, the American public has had a long training in optimism. Popular writers, and orators on platform and stump, have always taught us that ours is the greatest of nations in achievement, and that our natural resources are limitless and inexhaustible. It may be that general intelligence is sufficiently advanced to warrant the introduction of a third group into this classification. Whatever name may be given to the group, it includes those who, instead of constructing arguments to substantiate opinions, are interested only in what is true. They employ the simple and common sense method of modern science, stripping themselves of prejudice and desire, and attempt to see things only as they are.

Assuming this reasonable attitude as fully as possible, it is well to consider on its merits the question of the future sources of the world's daily bread. Since Malthus, more than a century ago, showed that population tended to outgrow subsistence, pessimists have declared universal famine to be near, while optimists have refused to consider the matter seriously, or believed that if the worst should occur, some chemist would succeed in synthesizing proteids from inorganic matter, or that something else would turn up to relieve the situation. While there is certainly no immediate occasion for alarm over the matter, the recent inauguration of an attempt to make a national inventory of all of our resources is a triumph of common sense.

Heretofore the young continent has produced a vast amount of human food that it has been necessary only to gather, while other natural resources — metals, gas, oil, coal, lumber, and fertile soils — have seemed to be limitless in quantity. Viewing the present conditions as they are, without unwarranted encouragement or discouragement, it is very clear that preceding generations, giving no thought to those who were to follow them, destroyed and wasted, without substantial benefit even to themselves, sources of natural wealth that, carefully conserved, might have provided comfort for many generations. If there is any excuse in the fact that our ancestors believed it to be impossible to destroy our natural resources, there is none for those of the present generation whose greed is deliberately and mercilessly cleaning up what remains, and leaving a far-reaching inheritance of ruin. Our criminal waste and our indifference to the fate of future generations, have been said, and probably with truth, to be without precedent in the history of peoples.

The best of our forests is gone, and their actual extent reduced by at least three hundred millions of acres. In lumbering and manufacturing, we waste from one-half to two-thirds of each tree. The method of lumbering is responsible for incalculably destructive fires that often destroy even the soils on which they occur. Nearly all of the waters of the deforested areas go to the seas in devastating floods, while summer brings its droughts. In the South alone, millions of acres of rich agricultural lands have been gullied beyond repair. The wonderful valleys west of the Cascades in Washington and Oregon, now attracting wide attention because of the peculiar fertility of their soils, and possessing probably more than a fourth of the available water-power of the nation, are endangered by the ruthless destruction of forests. It is estimated that a billion feet of natural gas — an ideal fuel — is every day allowed to escape from the earth unused, and that from one to two tons of coal are wasted in mining each ton that is marketed. Worse than all else, soils are being robbed. Agriculture is now practically impossible in Nev/ England, and farm values in the agricultural state of Ohio have suffered a decrease of sixty millions of dollars in a decade. All recall the wanton nature of the extermination of the buffalo and the passenger pigeon. Water-fowl are now rarely seen where, thirty years ago, migrating flocks stretched from horizon to horizon. The wonderful run of the salmon in the rivers of the Pacific slope has until recently been S believed to afford an inexhaustible supply of valuable food. Beside being put to this use, millions of pounds of salmon and herring have each year for a quarter of a century been utilized on the Pacific coast in the manufacture of fertilizer. Cod, mackerel, shad, and other valuable food fishes of the Atlantic, within the memory of men now living, were many times as abundant as now. At the present rate of decrease, the lobster must soon disappear from our eastern coast. Nearly every natural oyster field on the Atlantic has been destroyed. Most of the clam flats of New England, once immensely productive, are now almost barren.

But in spite of these depressing facts, there are many hopeful conditions to which attention should be given. Our natural resources may be separated into two groups, namely those consisting of materials accumulated through eons of time, which are replaced only by the infinitely slow processes of nature, and resources that may be made rapidly to perpetuate themselves under human direction and control. To the first belong ore deposits, petroleum, gas, and coal. These, once consumed, are gone forever. The second group includes organisms useful to man. Obviously the resources included in the first group should be used judiciously and without waste, in the knowledge that substitutes for them will one day be required. Those of the second group may never disappear.

While wanton destruction and waste are always deplorable, it must be admitted that even with the greatest care, animals and plants useful to man would, if allowed to remain under natural conditions, soon become too few in numbers to meet his requirements. The butchery of our buffalos by hide-hunters and European " sportsmen " naturally excited strong disapproval, but it hurried by very few years their extinction, that was inevitable from the occupation of their ranges by stockmen and agriculturists. The great multitudes of pigeons inhabiting the northern states east of the Mississippi half a century ago, met their fate largely through the destruction of their nesting and feeding places. Fishes, oysters, clams, and other animals propagating in a natural state, have rapidly decreased when used for food. Even the most prolific have proved to be anything but inexhaustible. But even if these forms had been used without waste, their final failure as sources of food would have been merely postponed. This inevitable destruction only becomes deplorable when it fails to be accompanied by an effort to domesticate, or in adequate measure to control the perpetuation of the vanishing form; for such effort in the past has in nearly all cases been marvelously successful. Man's achievements in domestication have been possible largely from the fact that he has nearly always been able to overcome in great measure the vast wastefulness of nature. In a natural state, seed is produced in profusion, but its growth is left largely to chance, and its destruction is enormous. Usually with little effort on man's part, intervention results in a rapid increase in the number of individuals.

Whenever terrestrial animals and plants have been domesticated, the achievement has consisted not merely in accelerating the rate of reproduction, but in controlling nearly every condition on which their lives depended, with an effect so far-reaching that most of them bear so little resemblance in structure and habit to their wild ancestors that the relationship would hardly be suspected. Indeed, the original forms from which many of them were derived, have been lost to human tradition and are entirely unknown. How great some of these changes are is illustrated in the many known descendants of a wild mustard plant. Among them are the numerous varieties of cabbages, cauliflowers, brtissels sprouts, kales, and kohlrabis, that are so different from each other and from their common parent, in the character of stem, root, leaf, and flower, in size, and in color, that it is difficult to believe what is known to be true concerning their relationships. Great changes equally useful to man, have also been made in animals on which he has come to depend, numerous examples of which will occur to any one.