unsuccessful
efforts made in Ceylon and India to preserve the young and immature
oysters on the storm-swept reefs by removing them to less exposed
areas. This has received close attention from the Ceylon authorities
during the last two years. Other practical measures which are
recommended for that region include "cultching," or the deposit of
suitable solid material, such as shells or broken stone, to which the
young oysters can attach themselves; thinning out overcrowded reefs,
and cleaning the beds by means of a dredge, thereby removing starfish
and other injurious animals. The attempts made by individuals and
associations to extend the range of the reefs on the coast of
Australia, among the Tuamotu Islands, in the Gulf of California, and
some other localities, are noted in the appropriate chapters. But it
may be stated that in most instances lack of adequate police
protection has been not the least of the difficulties with which these
experiments have had to contend.
Nor
has much greater success followed upon efforts to prevent the
exhaustion of the reefs and productive grounds through overfishing,
except in those instances in which the government exercises a
proprietory interest and determines the season, the area to be fished,
and the quantity of mollusks to be removed. The most prominent instance
of this is in Ceylon, where the fishery has been restricted to such
seasons and periods as appeared to insure the maximum yield of pearls.
Without restriction upon the fishery, the pearl-oyster in that populous
region would doubtless become almost extinct in a few years. Another
instance of proprietory interest on the part of the government is in
some of the German States, where pearl fishing has been regulated and
restricted for centuries. But there the sewage from cities and
factories has accomplished almost as effectively, if less rapidly, what
unrestricted fishing· would have done.
Much
attention has been given to the subject of pearl-culture in Bavaria,
where the government has granted a small subsidy to encourage this
industry, and a model pearl-mussel bank has been established in one of
the brooks for the rational culture of the mussels.
On
the Australian coast, the only theoretical protection of consequence
is the restriction on taking small or immature oysters; but, owing to
the great area over which the fisheries· are prosecuted there, it has
not been possible to enforce the regulations. At some of the Pacific
islands and elsewhere, interdictions exist as to use of certain
apparatus of capture, but this is intended for the purpose of reserving
the industry to dependent natives rather than for protecting the reefs.
Several efforts have been made to insure adequate protection for the
Unios in our American rivers, but nothing in this direction has yet
been accomplished by legislative enactment, except in Illinois.
