![]() ![]() The number of men employed in the industry is 15,000, and the number of men partly employed or dependent on the industry is 60,000. The condition of Virginia's oyster division, taken from the commissioner's last report (1923), shows an approximate value of the output of oysters from natural rocks of $2,400,000, and from private planting ground, $1,000,000 from fish, crabs, clams, etc., $7,000,000. Also the confidence of the public has been restored after having been shaken by an attack made in the West on the oyster and paralyzing the Industry, with no good cause. But the outlook is good, raw material being plentiful and conditions and equipment much improved. The weather having been rather warm up to this time orders have not been as large as were expected, and being yet early in the season we can not forecast the results for this season. These cans are then packed for shipment in sugar barrels or boxes and iced around the cans. When you buy a gallon you get all that the measure will hold. They are packed in new one-gallon sterilized cans, solid meat. Oysters are shucked as clean as is practicable for them to be, and washed with the more modern devices that are to be had - not over-washed or bloated. No oysters are allowed to be used other than those taken from waters declared free from pollution by the Federal and State authorities.Īny polluted territories are closed by Federal authority and policed by the Virginia Commission of Fisheries' forces. The shucking and packing departments are kept clean and are quipped with hot and cold water systems, liquid soap and towels. All of the stalls have concrete bottoms and are kept clean. While the outward appearances of some of these houses is unsightly and not a credit to the industry, the interior has been so renovated and modernized that someone - it may be the Health and Food Departments or packers, or perhaps all of them - should be complimented. On the Eastern Shore there are more than 100 oyster packing plants. There are in Norfolk and Portsmouth 12 or more wholesale packing houses, some of which handle both oysters and fish. ![]() Our laws are good, with few exceptions, as regards fish, oysters and crabs. This seems to me as necessary, as there is little young strike perceptible today on the lower rocks of the James. Many of these in the James and upper Potomac are too small for the shucking trade, but if the three-inch cull law is enforced the smaller ones would be left on the rocks, which would mean better oysters at present and more for the future. There is an abundant supply of oysters on the rocks in the James, Rappahannock and Potomac Rivers. Much of this bottom would be producing if shells were planted, and we feel assured that the industry can be more thoroughly developed in Virginia. Virginia has about 240,000 acres of producing bottom, or natural rock, and 400,000 acres of non-producing or planting bottom, of which latter probably not more than a fourth is in demand or leased, leaving approximately 300,000 acres idle. They may some day make it commercially valuable. Some other states are experimenting scientifically to secure the spat and are meeting with some success. No other place, so far as we know, offers such inducements to oyster growers. They will catch on any old rubbish, old scrap tin and iron, brick bats, old rubber boots, glass bottles, stone jugs or most anything that is clean and hard enough to receive the spat. Every old iron hulk that has been sunk in the lower Chesapeake Bay is literally covered with oysters, inside and out. Nature provides Virginia alone with oyster spat sufficient to supply the entire country, if they could all be saved. It is recognized that the seaside of the Eastern Shore and the Chesapeake Bay country is the greatest oyster producing territory in the world. Every coastal state from Massachusetts to southern Texas, and from Washington to California has this industry, though Maine and New Hampshire can boast of only a few. The oyster is one of the most valuable of all the fisheries, with an annual yield in the United States of approximately 30 or more millions of bushels, and Virginia furnishes probably 20 per cent of the entire output of the country. We will deal first with the oyster, which is thought by many to be the most important branch of this industry. The Virginia seafood industry, of which Franklin City, Wachapreague, Willis Wharf, Oyster, Cape Charles, Norfolk, Portsmouth, Newport News, Hampton and Pheobus are the principal markets and shipping points, is probably second only to agricultural pursuits. ![]()
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