Sturgeon Centre opens on Vancouver Island
Some 80 participants cramped into a small room at the newly finished centre which has replaced a primitive set of largely outdoor tanks that had been housing some of these prehistoric creatures for the past ~12 years or so. Originating from “a ditch near the Fraser River”, a few specimens of the endangered White Sturgeon were collected and housed at the university in order for researchers to conduct studies that were aimed at eventually restoring the region’s populations to historic levels. The sturgeon population in the Fraser has had its ups and downs during this period, but stocks are sufficiently healthy to allow for a catch-and-release sport fishery every summer.
But as reported previously by FishfarmingXpert, once the staff at the university figured out how to successfully spawn the large fish, interest grew in the commercial culture of the fish for the production of caviar, coinciding with the rapid decline in supply of high quality caviar from the Caspian Sea region. Target Marine Hatcheries on the B.C. Sunshine Coast has been waiting 11 years for their first and oldest fish to start producing caviar, and this year saw the first fish come through- some weighing upward of 120 Kg, according to General Manager Justin Henry- one of the guests at today’s ceremony.
Mr. Henry also informed the participants of the Grand Opening of the ICSS that his company’s product recently received first price in a caviar competition held in New York, with some 15 producers from all over the world participating in the contest which was sponsored by the Travel & Leisure Magazine. Initial marketing efforts suggest a selling price of some CAD$ 3,000 (~€ 2,147)per kilo of finished, cured caviar from Target Marine.
The approximately CAD$6 million (~€ 4.3 million) ICSS facility was made possible by a number of government funding agencies, along with the university itself and a generous donation by Marine Harvest Canada of fibreglass tanks valued at over CAD$ 200,000 (~€143,000). The original application for funding was submitted in 2004 to the Canada Foundation for Innovation. University President Ralph Nilson pointed out the importance of partnerships in such initiatives, including the ongoing partnership that the university has with the local Snuneymuxw First Nation.
