Every evening, Wilmington daily commercial., 1918-05-23
STURGEON, MOST
PRECIOUS OF FISH,
FETCH $500 EACH
Rose From Despised Hobo of
River to Autocrat of Dinner
Table by Her Roe: Caviar.
is NOW NEARLY EXTINCT


of the carcass of one in this city bring to
the fore the fact that this most precious
of food fish has become nearly extinct in
the water ways of Delaware. Forty years
ago sturgeon were as plentiful as are
Office seekers today; now they are scarce
IL less rare than the tabled dodo >
The secret unfoded to the river fishers,
thirty or more years ago, that the roe
of the sturpeon-plus much salt-was the
appetite bracer known as cavler, which
was the top liner and lead the figures on
all menus de luxe; was the swan song
for the big fish Since then the passing
of the sturgeon has been on. untE the
fish that lays the golden egg Is we'll nigh
extinct.
RIVER ABoUNDED WITH STURGEON.
Fishermen with memories forty years
long recall when the Delaware, SO abound
ed with sturgeon that they were regarded
as an intolerable nuisance worthless,
useless. Strong swimmers, they plunged
into shad nets, making wide lanes through
the meshv ENHANCEMENT, and provoking
the owners TO the liberation of such pro
family as early day fisher folk seemed TO
have in reserve for even trltllng cmer-
gencies
Consequently the sturgeon was openly
regarded as a foe-friendless and every
fisherman slew all that came his way IN
reprisal for net breaking, and tossed the
carcass back into the river.
No one in those days was humble
enough to cat the flesh Of this hobo Of
fish. He was even accused Of umcleanlI-
ness, of wallowing in the river bottom
mud, in fact, OF being an acquatlc hog.
swEDEs FIRST ATE THE FISH.
Some venturesome fishers wife how
ever, discovered-what the Swcdes re-
corded nearly POO years bcfore-that the
sturgeon was by no means impossible Tor
food. but intact was quite excellent but tor
q coarseness and a pronounced fish tang.
After this the fish gradually found ITS
way into homes where appetltles were
keen and the larder scant, but It has
never been able to follow the roe into
Society.
In early days the sturgeon had a very
small market value, when sold to manu-
facturcrs OF fertilizers, who also extracted
a small quantity of oil from portions Of
the carcass 1t was not, however, until
Dutch Hen and Pete settled at
Port Penn that there was q constant de
mand or channel for regularly dIsposIng Of
the fish These two Teutons came 10
Delaware via the fisheries Of the Pacific
coast, and in a truly humble way they
started the manufacture OF cav1er.
CAREFULLY GUARDED SECRET.
The formula for making cavicr they
brought with them from Germany. or
from Norway, possibly, and with true
German gene erosity-typical and char
acteristic as one knows now-thev shared
their secret with no one. They bought
sturgeon of the fishermen for dollar or
two each. and waxed fat so rapidly that
their prosperity became conspicuous, and
aroused the envy of the fishermen, who
insisted that they be taught the modus of
transforming sturgeon roe Into~ay1er gold.
Pete" and Hen are said to have
withstood these demands for two or
three wears, and 10 have then promised TO
lay bare the secret process. Not unlike
more recent and less humble of their race,
they broke this pact, after parleyIng
wear or two, waiting, as they sad, 10 get
8 suitable salt OF q particular kind. which
could only be had in Germany and by
persons with q pull After this excuse
had become time worn and the fishers
ewes were slowly opening, Pete and
Hen poeketed their sufficient fortune
in cash and moved on without enhghten-
ing the fishermen on the question OF
eavier making.
SURGEONS DOOM SEALED.
a wear or two later, however, the
formula was given to the men who hauled
the nets. and from that moment the doom
of the sturgeon was sealed. CavIer,
thev learned, is made by rubbing the roe
through a serve. adding salt and more salt,
and further curing il by mixing and STIR
ring and adding salt again
To witness the man ufacture IS not an
aesthetic treat, and II may be wondered if
gourmands, who find the genuine I'M
ported Astrakhan Cavier so exactly fitted
10 their idea OF what IS really good TO eat
would digest 1t with so much satisfaction
were they to see this Russian exotic in the
making-on the Delaware But cavier
is not the only article Of food whose
manufacture might not whet an appetite.
ROE S2.75 a POUND.
So, in these later days, the sturgeon
has met with financial appreciation, top
ping most all other advances in foods
Forty years ago it was q worthless hulk
a nuisance Today roe sturgeon nets
the fisherman $500 or $3.50, or possibly
$500 The flesh IS now sold readily at
from % TO 2S cents when there Is any to
sell, whereas, only a few years ago.
camoufaged as Albany beef it had
small demand In the cities, and Welded
the shipper about ) cents pound
But II is the sturgeon roe that counts
big. Last season the roe sold for as much
as S275 cents a pound, with keen
market call for every ounce. As 100
pounds of roe IS not an excessive yield Of
q far-s'z zed fsh-for the roe sturgeon S a
large producer-it is quite easy 10 discern
how valuable are these plscatorial prizes.
II likewise is readily deducible that the
buck sturgeon has little value, So one
can truly say of the sturgeon family, that
the female of the species Is more precious
than the male.
With $500 on the bead Of each roe
sturgeon she and her kind are going the
way of the diamond backed terrapin and
the canvas back duck, and her final
passage will be no less regretted than that
of the turtle or the fowl.
The sturgeon catch in the Delaware
last year did not exceed a hundred fish;
twenty-five years ago more than a hun
dred were taken every day by fishermen.
ALL FOOD fishes GOING.
But the sturgeon Is not alone IN the
going. for all other varieties Of food fish
are disappearing. The shad and the
herring, for instance, seem to be gradually
following the sturgeon into the shadow
Efforts OF the Federal government
scientific and persistent aimed to
keep our waters stocked with these in
comparable food fish. These attempts