File 2830/1914 Pt 2 'Persian Gulf: Pearl Fisheries. Investigation into Alleged Depletion of Pearl Banks. Germans and the Industry. Concessions, etc.' [‎249r] (510/578)

Captain Donnan has stated that the Muttuvarattu Paar is peculiarly liable to injury from
current. Flood and current can be taken, I think, to account for the disappearance of the oysters,
and there was both flood and current during the season from beginning of December, 1.898, to the
end of January, 1899. I arrived in Colombo on my return from England on the 8 th January, and
was told there had been abnormally heavy rains in the north, north-west, and east. I obtained per
mission to come to Jaffna in an immigrant brig. We were some days beating up to Paumben against
a strong current, and were detained over a week in Paumben by a strong current through the channel.
There was heavy rain in Paumben, and I was told also in Jaffna, so late as the 20th January—“a
thing almost unprecedented.” When beating up to Paumben, in one of the tacks towards Ceylon,
we made the land near Talavillu (near St. Anna’s). Talavillu is not very far from the Muttuva
rattu Paar, and I then remarked to a lady in the ship and to thetindal that “ if Captain Donnan makes
an inspection of the banks this year I should not wonder if he finds the oysters gone.”
I believed at the time that the flood and current might injuriously affect them. I may be
wrong in the opinion I hold, but I shall show hereafter that there have been three disappearances of
oysters, in connection with two of which floods had, I believe, a great deal to do, and current and flood
with the other.
It is highly probable, as suggested by Captain Donnan, that skates and other fish preyed on the
oysters to some extent. From the experiences* of 1863 and 1864 of what occurred on the Cheval
bank, 1 believe that skates are attracted to a bank when the oysters are dying out, just as jackals and
vultures are to a carcase.
Captain Donnan, in his report on the inspection of 1888,f on which the fishery of 1889 at
Dutch Bay was decided on, remarked that the oysters, which he considered almost too young to be
fished, were dying out, and it was advisable therefore to fish them, though too young. He also
remarked as one of his reasons for urging the fishery that the bank was “ exposed to currents.”
I do not know that this bank is more exposed to currents than other banks ; but it may be that
currents from the north, north-east, and east may have greater effect over it than over the other
banks, and this may be accounted for by the fact that the Muttuvarattu Paar, unlike the Cheval and
Modaragam, which shelve gradually into deep water, dips suddenly into 13 and 15 fathoms on the
west and south-west.J
At the fishery of 1891, in a conversation I had with one of the chief divers (a Moorman of
Keelakarai), he informed me that this sudden shelving of the bank into deep water rendered, it
impossible for the divers to get at some oysters on that part of the bank, as they were afraid of being
sucked into the deep water.§
The current from north-west, which swept over the Cheval in 1888 and carried off most of the
oysters, did not appear to have affected the Muttuvarattu Paar, which yielded a fishery, as I have
remarked, in 1889, and again in 1890 and 1891.
“ False Spat.”}
Before going further I think it as well to invite attention to a very serious misapprehension
which has existed in regard to the spat of the pearl oyster, both in Ceylon and Tuticorin. This has
been owing to ignorance of the nature of the 6< real spat ” of the pearl oyster and to dependence in
consequence on the erroneous ideas entertained regarding the spat of the oyster by the native divers
and others, and whose statements were accepted as correct, and as the result of long experience by
Superintendents and Inspectors who have been employed on the pearl banks.
Until 1885 two small descriptions of shells, whose term of existence does not probably exceed
twelve months, have been mistaken for the real spat of the pearl oyster, and the appearance of these
shells adhering thickly to a species of weed^I floating on the sea and adhering to rock has been reported
on many occasions (apparently) as the appearance of “ numbers of young oysters on the banks, and
their disappearance (at a following inspection) as the “ disappearance of the oysters seen at the last
inspection.” „ _ . . , , , „
Mr. Thomas of the Madras Civil Service, in his report|| (above referred to) pointed out tor the
first time what this “false spat,” as he terms it, really was, Captain Phipps, Master Attendant o
Tuticorin, having invited his attention to it, and having expressed his doubts as to its being the real
pearl oyster spat. . „ ,
My first acquaintance with the “ false spat” was at the inspection of the banks'"* m March,
1867, which I made with Captain Donnan in the hired steamer “ General Hevelock.” We were
informed that it was “real oyster spat” by those who were supposed to know. The Naturalist,
Mr. Holdsworth, who was with us, treated it as real oyster spat, and had a quantity of it put into an
iron tank with holes bored in it, which he caused to be placed on the karatiyu shoal m J 3 fathoms
of water, tt with the result, however (as might have been anticipated), that the tank, sunk into tne
sand, was with difficulty discovered, at the inspection of 1868 full of sand and covered with sand and
"' ee<L Captain Donnan having gone to England on leave in 1867, I made the inspection in March,
1868, in a sailing ship, the “ Royal Eagle,” with a Mr. Leighton of the Merchant Service, who acted for
Captain Donnan as Master Attendant and Inspector. We found that the so-called oyster spat,4
together with the weed, had disappeared from where it was in 1867, hut quantities of it were found
on other parts of the banks. , . , , , -j n , .
I entertained very serious doubts as to whether this was oyster spat at all, and so did Captain
Leighton, and we accordingly wrote as follows in our report:
The appearance last year on the principal bank (viz, the Cheval) of what the native divers declared to be
young pearl oysters, in such myriads, raised hopes that the banks were about to be replenished, which however do
hot seem likely just now to be realized, the shells, whatever they may have been, having disappeared together with
the weed they were on from the whole extent of the bank as already stated. . . ,
Similar shells have appeared this year on other banks where none were found last year, lying as thick, though
not over so large an extent of ground. * I II
* See Appendix 5, A and B.
f See Appendix 8, A and B.
I See Chart attached to Appendix 7, E.
§ See Appendix 8, I), E, and (x.
II See Appendix 1, A and B.
Said to be Sargassum mlgare.
** See Appendix 6, B.
ff See Appendix 6, A and Gr.
JJ See Appendix 6, D.