Mary Ann Eckert, age 12, of Indianapolis, Indiana, for her question:
How does an oyster multiply?
The parent oysters multiply only when the water is pleasantly warm. The temperature must be between 66 and 70 degrees Fahrenheit, In the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico the young oysters get started in March and new crops keep coming along through October. In the cooler waters off New England, the new generation does not get started until July,
The parents are stodgy old stay‑at‑homes, firmly fixed to the floor of some quiet bay. When the time comes to multiply, both the mother and the father oyster pour countless egg cells into the water. During one season, a mother oyster may pour forth a billion eggs. Only a few of these will meet up with a sperm cell from a Papa oyster. Two cells, egg cell and sperm cell, unite to form an egg which may grow into an oyster.
The oyster egg is adrift in the water. It may be swept out to sea, caught and smothered in sand, mud or seaweed, or it may get eaten; Only one oyster egg in four million has a chance of overcoming all the dangers and enemies he must face in the first few weeks of life,
The little egg develops at a great rate. In five to ten hours it becomes a free swimming larva. This fellow looks like a tiny melon seed with a toupee on one end, His oval body is already encased in two flaky shells and the toupee is a mass of waving hairs which propels him through the water.
At the end of‑two weeks, the baby oyster is dust about big enough to be seen. Along with 75 of his brothers he measures an inch, Ho is now wise enough to know that the dangerous free swimming life is not for him, He knows now that llama knows best and he plans to settle in some quiet spot and lead a stodgy stay‑‑at‑home life for the rest of his days,
You might think that the little fellow’s troubles are now all over. But actually he has reached, perhaps, the most dangerous hours of his young life. Much can go wrong and. he can wake many mistakes in choosing a spot on which to settle. As a grown oyster, he must live where there is a constant supply of clean flowing sea water. Every day he may need a whole barrelful of clean sea water, bearing food and oxygen, to flow through his gills.
Oyster fishermen call the baby oyster's task of settling either setting or striking. The little fellow sinks down in the water until he touches bottom, Then he immediately begins to give off a sticky cement which hardens and glues him to the floor. If ho has chosen a muddy floor he is soon choked. Seaweed can also choke him. He may strike above the tide level and find himself left high and dry when the tide goes onto
The lucky oyster strikes on some hard clear surface, perhaps on an old oyster shall, a rock or the post of a wharf. Plenty of sea water flows around him. He feeds on tiny diatoms, grows big and fat and his shell grows with him. In about four years, this one‑in‑.four‑million oyster will be ready for the market.