New-York tribune., 1912-03-24

WTHEN a man chops off the butt end OF a
w boiled egg at the breakfast table, 1t
hardly occurs to him to think that he is deal
ing with marine product, and yet the egg,
so far as its shell is concerned, is likely to an
swer to that description, inaSmuch as the
lime of which it is composed may have been
originally separated from sea water by an
oyster.
Vast quantities of oyster shells are ground
up for chicken feed, and are forwarded IN
this shape by the tens of thousands OF BUSH
els to the Middle West, the great egg pro-
ducing region of the world. Factories on the
Chesapeake and along the Gulf Coast handle
them in this way, reducing them to small
scraps in machines somewhat like rock
crushers, though much less in size. Finally
they are put up in bags for shipment, the
lmy dust incidentally produced being
thrown away.
This dust will likely be saved as valuable
byproduct few years from now, IN obedl-
ence to the growing economic tendency to
turn all sorts of waste to useful account. As
for the broken oyster Shells they reappear
commercially not only as eggshellS, but also
as chicken bones, actually furnishing material
for the skeletons of millions on millions OF
the fowls that come to market.
VET it was only twenty years ago that
oyster shells were regarded as of less than
no value, and the packing companies engaged
in canning the "meats' had much trouble to
dispose of them. When they could not give
them away, they paid money to have them
carted of and dumped. In 1890 the mar.
ketmen of Baltimore paid twenty thousand
dollars to get nd of oyster shells, the accu-
mutation of which was a perpetual and ever
increasing nuisance.
Since then, however, it has been diScOv-
cred that oyster shells should be regarded
rather as an asset than rs liability. In
1892 the wholesale shuckers at Baltimore
were getting half a cent a buShel for their
shells, and since then the price has risen,
until now this long despised article OF mer.
chandiSe commonly brings cent and a halt
a bushel. The shells are shipped by thou
sands of tons from Maryland to other
States, where they are used for making
roads, in the manufacture of carbonc acid
gas, in the production of special grades OF
iron, and for railroad beds. For the last
purpose they serve almost as we'll as stone.
One sees workmen mixing mortar for
building that is going up. The lime put INTO
it ian essential constituen) is derived from
oyster shells. Fences and outhouseS are
painted with whitewash, a substance the
very name of which has come to have pc
culiar significance as implying cleanliness
and the effective Encouragement of germs.
Whitewash, of course, is merely oyster shells
in solution.
THE most important use of oyster shells,
however, is for cultch (the term applied
to material put into the water for young
oysters to grow upon). AT present the bulk
of the oyster shells produced in the waters of
New York, Connecticut, and Long Island is
turned to account in this way. The shells
are dumped upon the bottom in June, when
the spawning season of the oyster is begin
ming, and invite the baby bivalves to settle
upon them.
The process might be likened to scattering
corncobs over dry land with the expectation
of picking up ripe ears in full grain few
months later. By the adoption of this