. Cyclopedia of farm animals. Domestic animals; Animal products. 638 SHELL-FISH SHELL-FISH private oyster-planting. Such grounds are some- times secured under a title that permits their sale and transfer by inheritance. The market value of the best ground is above a thousand dollars an acre, although the average is thirty dollars. The grounds are taxed, or a rental may be charged for land leased from the state. The area of leased land in the United States is about 360,000 acres. Ten times this area is avail- able for future expansion, aside from the natural ground, which, if it came under cult
. Cyclopedia of farm animals. Domestic animals; Animal products. 638 SHELL-FISH SHELL-FISH private oyster-planting. Such grounds are some- times secured under a title that permits their sale and transfer by inheritance. The market value of the best ground is above a thousand dollars an acre, although the average is thirty dollars. The grounds are taxed, or a rental may be charged for land leased from the state. The area of leased land in the United States is about 360,000 acres. Ten times this area is avail- able for future expansion, aside from the natural ground, which, if it came under cultivation, would yield thirty times its present product. Only a third of the leased area is actually under cultiva-. Fig. 644. Tonging oysters into a scow. tion. The amount one person may hold is some- times limited. The largest oyster farm (7,000 acres) is owned by a firm in Connecticut. It is advantageous to shift oysters to new ground in the spring or autumn, and it is good policy to let a plot lie fallow for a year after the crop is removed, in order to disperse enemies that have gathered. As it requires three or four years for seed to grow to market size, the annual crop is produced from only a fourth of the ground occu- pied. About three hundred bushels of average young seed, costing twenty to forty cents a bushel, may be planted per acre. Under favorable conditions, this will have increased threefold when ready for market. Usually the planter is content to gather nearly the same quantity as was planted, the oysters having become enhanced three to four times in value. Young seed doubles in growth the first season, the losses during the next balance the increase, and thereafter the death losses overbal- ance the growth. The average annual net profit is about 10 per cent on the investment. Oyster-culture. Oyster-culture has developed through several stages of progress by the pressure of circum- stances. So long as the natural beds yielded a suffi- cient supply'of choice oyste
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Keywords: ., bookauthorbaileylh, bookcentury1900, bookdecade1920, bookyear1922
