Doroshov was attracted to California because of the white sturgeon. It yields a caviar comparable to Soviet beluga. Caviar comes from one of the world's strangest families of fish. Most are anadromous, living part of their lives in seawater but migrating to freshwater to spawn. The creatures survived almost unchanged in our rivers and bays for some 200 million years.
Sturgeon have no bones or teeth.
They are all cartilage. Instead of a backbone, they have a notochord, a flexible cartilaginous rod running down the back. The asymmetrical tail is also a primitive characteristic, once seen in ancient fishes that lacked swimbladders to help them float. Those creatures needed the lift provided by a tail to help them move through the water. Some of their other qualities are simply strange.