basis of this survey, we estimate that if all juvenile oysters attached to
1962 shells were to survive to marketable size, the crop would exceed
8, 500, 000 bushels—at current prices worth more than $35 million. We
know, of course, that all will not survive, but I can assure you that no
effort will be spared to accomplish maximum survival. The Cull Law
is being rigidly enforced and will continue to be enforced. The State
has an investment of more than $1 million in this potential crop of
oysters, and we intend to see that this investment is protected and that
full value is received.

Although the State's main effort in the management of Tidewater
resources has been to increase the production of oysters, let me assure
you that its other marine resources have not been neglected. The State
Department of Tidewater Fisheries has carefully delineated and pro-
tected the spawning areas of rockfish. We hope, and believe, that the
record catches of 1960 and 1961 will continue. Attention is being
directed now to the utilization of species heretofore unexploited. The
experts tell me that eels, smoked or live, are a valuable product in many
parts of the world, and that Maryland has an abundant supply. In the
Upper Bay area and at the heads of many tributaries, I am also told,
there are carp in large quantities, the commerical use of which would
provide not only additional income for fishermen but would improve
environmental conditions in the spawning areas. We have asked the
Bureau of Commercial Fisheries to extend its exploratory fishing pro-
gram to the off-shore waters of Maryland, with the hope that many
unexploited fisheries resources may be discovered.

Maryland's soft shell clam industry affords the very finest example of
what can be accomplished through imagination, ingenuity and the
cooperative effort about which I have been speaking. The imagination
and the ingenuity were supplied by a Maryland waterman who devel-
oped a unique machine capable of harvesting clams. The cooperative
effort was supplied by State researchers who demonstrated the effective-
ness of the machine in harvesting marketable clams with a minimum
damage to juvenile clams and other marine resources. The result, as
we all know, is that Maryland has been able to develop a new and
important fishery. And while New England's clam fisheries have con-
tinued to decline, Maryland's have continued to grow.

All of us are fully aware that we will have accomplished nothing by
increasing our seafood yield if we fail to find a market for our products.
It is in the development of such a market—in the creation of new and
better products, in the improvement of processing and packaging, in
stimulating the consumption of the products—that this Association, and

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