Santander, February 19th-22nd 2008 - Aranzadi

The U.S. Freshwater Shell Button Industry
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20). Some species colonize the edges of beds
where a brail was least likely to drag. Furthermore,
when the water is low the musseler gets a very different
proportion of species and even different species
from when working in high water (Wilson and
Clark 1914: 20). Cold water, such as occurs seasonally
in streams or a flush of water from snow melt,
will cause the mollusc to close up and be inaccessible
to brailing. When the water is very warm they
also close up. Lund’s informants told him that from
mid-July to early September the mussels close up
and are impossible to catch with crowfoot hooks,
except before 8:00 A.M. (Lund 1983: 641).
Modern musselers (working since 1950 to
send shells to Japan for the cores in cultured
pearls) have used 30 foot long rakes, tongs and
dredges to remove shells from beds 10-20 feet
deep in colder rivers and lakes. Toe-digging and
free diving allow motivated individuals to get shells
from 5’ to 20’ deep, and branch dragging would
probably work for beds as deep as 7’.
4. THE SHELLFISHERS
4.1. Modern yields per person
During the days of the button industry, the
various types of equipment used had much to do
with the yield per person. At the LeClair bed, one
person could rake up to 800 lbs. daily. One worker
on Lake Pepin reported getting 80 buckets a day
by brailing (or 2000 lbs) when the lake reopened in
1924 and then slipping to 40 buckets a day (1000
lbs) late in the season. Over 1000 tons of shells
were removed by 80 musselers over 10 weeks in
1924 from Lake Pepin for an average of 12.5 tons
each person.
Shellers were gathering 15-20 tons of shells a
season in 1911 on the Fox River (Eldridge 1914).
The number of recreational pearlers on some
Sundays was estimated at 500. In the Five Island
bed in 1911, after two years of shelling, the average
take was 10-12 tons per person that year. North
of Carpentersville on the Fox River, 15-20 tons of
shells were the average haul per sheller the first
year this area was worked (1911). Below Yorkville,
a 7 ton take by one person in 1911 was considered
excellent. On the Millington-Sheridan bed, four
tons per sheller was average in 1911, after two
years of heavy shelling.
In 1912, from Kampsville to the mouth of the
Illinois River, there were about 150 boats operating
with a daily yield of 500 to 700 pounds of shell per
musseler.
Musseling for the modern cultured pearl industry
is conducted by diving or by brailing. A husband and
wife team worked 10 hours brailing daily to bring up
300 to 800 pounds of shell around Harper’s Ferry
(Mississippi R.) after 1951. In 1962, the average
Tennessee River musseler brought in 400 lbs. of
shells daily.
“I buy seven days a week from about 130-140
divers. Have 13 men at the home base. Monday I
bought 23 tons, Tuesday 20 tons, Wednesday 17.5
tons—it lessens each day of the week as people get
tired” (interview with Butch Ballinger 1987). Ballinger’s
figures mean that 130 divers were bringing up 353
lbs on Monday, and less through the week, declining
to 269 lbs per day.
The various authors report a range of 300 to 1000
pounds per day per boat, and a range of 10-20 tons
per season or year with rewards as low as 4 tons in
long harvested areas. It would appear from these
observations that a yield below 300 pounds daily or 4
tons annually during the button industry days would
cause the musseler to loose interest and a stream to
be declared unproductive by industry buyers.
Today’s buyers pay well enough that a daily win of
269 pounds proves profitable to a sheller.
This intensive harvesting by musselers did have
its impact on the populations of species being exploited.
Musselers however, knew that they simply could
move to a different section of river or to a different river
to continue to harvest shells when their income fell
below their own standard. However, the standards for
the button businesses often changed thus changing
the definition of a marketable shell. In the initial years
only four or five species were considered usable for
button production. As the supply of these shells dwindled
at the favoured beds (closest to the factories),
companies experimented with other species and
upon finding them suitable, enlarged the list of shell
species they were willing to buy. In some cases this
redefinition of a usable shell made it possible to return
to rivers earlier pronounced “exhausted”. An unusual
export demand would cause high prices for the best
shells, forcing the companies to use lower-quality
shells for domestic button production. Rivers where
the shells had been pronounced inferior subsequently
could support a mussel fishery. These changes
in the national and international markets produced
a rather complex mosaic of musseling history
and economics in a region.
4.2. Collecting Pressure
Where human predation presumably caused a
decline in shellfish, their numbers did recover and
MUNIBE Suplemento - Gehigarria 31, 2010
S.C. Aranzadi. Z.E. Donostia/San Sebastián