The following investigations were carried out in order to test the validity of the oft-recurring statement to the effect that “burrowing organisms live under fresh-water conditions during low tide in estuaries.” This type of statement is usually made in respect to organisms which live in the sand or mud of estuaries in which, at low tide, a stream of fresh, water passes over the ground in which the organisms are buried.

I have not been able to find any references to show that work has ever been done on this subject with the idea of determining the actual salinity of the water held by such sand. Therefore I carried out the following experiments to try to find if data could be procured which would be sufficiently consistent to lead to any conclusions.