Deliciously fishy fundraising idea
Nanaimo researchers selling cans of smoked sturgeon to study giant fish
Armour-plated white sturgeon — little changed in millions of years — are being raised, smoked and packed in cans to earn extra cash for Vancouver Island University in Nanaimo.
Sales are brisk but supply is limited for this novel item in B.C.’s seafood market.
“The texture is very firm,” said Dave Switzer, technician at the university’s International Centre for Sturgeon Studies. Flesh is white, flaky, oily and unlike any other fish in taste, Switzer said. “Everywhere else in the world, sturgeon is a delicacy.”
Anglers in B.C. are not allowed to catch and keep sturgeon. Most white sturgeon in this province are listed under the federal Species at Risk Act.
However, a catch and release fishery using barbless hooks is permitted in the lower and middle Fraser River, even though those populations are rated endangered.
White sturgeon are the largest and longest-lived freshwater fish species in Canada.
“Their armour-plated, torpedoshaped bodies can exceed six me- tres in length and weigh up to 635 kilograms. Individuals can live to be more than 100 years of age, and this unique species has persisted relatively unchanged for millions of years,” a Fisheries Department pamphlet says.
The Nanaimo centre is starting its small-scale venture to bring in additional money to support its work. It has been raising and studying these giants since 1984. The centre’s aim is to learn more about sturgeon, share that knowledge with students, and to analyze its viability as a farmed product.
Testing includes evaluating growth in different temperatures and conditions.
“We can get sturgeon to grow as fast as salmonids,” and these fish are extremely hardy, Switzer said.
Salmon form the base of B.C.’s aquaculture industry, with the vast majority of the fish raised in net pens in the ocean.
Nanaimo’s sturgeon are raised in above-ground freshwater tanks on university grounds.
As of Thursday, only a few cans of smoked sturgeon remained in the university’s bookstore, out of the first 1,800 cans, at 170 grams each, produced in March.
Buyers will have to wait for the next harvest in October-November, expected to result in more than 3,000 cans of smoked sturgeon. They sell for $9 in the bookstore and up to $12 at local retail outlets. Switzer anticipates another harvest in spring 2017.
Total revenue has not yet been calculated, although it will be in the tens of thousands of dollars, Switzer said.
Two- and three-year-old youngsters, weighing two to six kilograms, are harvested twice a year and sent to St. Jean’s Cannery and Smokehouse, also in Nanaimo. “They are actually a perfect size to fillet and smoke and can,” Switzer said.