Excerpt from The American Oyster Crassostrea Virginica Gmelin The influence of other factors of the environ ment on the shape and sculpture of oyster shell has been reported by many investigators who noticed that specimens growing in calm water on flat surfaces have a tendency to acquire a round shape and to have poorly developed umbones. On soft bottom and overcrowded reefs the same species tend to form long and slender, laterally compressed bodies with hooklike umbones. Lamy (1929) observed that oysters attached to a pebble or shell and, therefore, slightly raised above the bottom, had deep lower valves, more or less radially ribbed. This type of structure, according to Lamy, offered greater resistance to dislodgment by currents or wave action. 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.