Excerpt from Loch Creran: Notes From the West Highlands What harm can mussels do to oysters indeed. Just come round this way and we take our incredulous friend to the few hundred molluscs lately thrown from the boat at random on the foreshore. On the gravel, Of late, a deposit of young mussels has been rapidly maturing, and upon these the large oysters from deeper water had ac cidentally been thrown. We lift one after another to find the byssus of the mussel firmly attached, and gradually extending over the shells, which are closed for a time at low water. A very few days and a good few of these strong oysters with powerfully developed muscles would have been most effectually choked by the numerous tenacious cords of the mussel having closed the shell too firmly to permit the spring Of the oyster to expand and open it. What would they not have done to a bed of small, delicate shelled oysters in a similar position? It is impossible to estimate the injury done in this way to an oyster bed by a shell fish which grows to a certain maturity with great rapidity. There is a large bank of mussels Of a certain size at the mouth of the river Awe that are said to die down every autumn when they reach a certain stage so that those about an inch or so in length must be but six months old. At this age an oyster is a delicate helpless creature, while these mussels are capable of forming a bank of such a mass, and so tied together, that nothing has a chance upon it but themselves. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.