TEE PASSING OF TEE STURGEON 361 



THE PASSING OF THE STURGEON: A CASE OF THE 

 UNPARALLELED EXTERMINATION OF A 



SPECIES 



By WALTER SHELDON TOWER, Ph.D. 



ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF GEOGRAPHY, UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA 



THERE is little chance for doubt that the sturgeon was originally 

 present in great abundance both in the coastal and the inland 

 waters of the United States, since frequent mention of the species is 

 found in the annals of the colonial period. Probably the earliest men- 

 tion of this fish is found in Burk's "History of Virginia/' where it is 

 stated that a sturgeon fishery existed in that colony in 1626. 1 For 

 some reason, however, this early experiment did not prove successful 

 and was abandoned. A century later Beverley's history of the same 

 colony states that the rivers contained " multitudes of shad, rock and 

 sturgeon," the last-named species being caught with nooses by the 

 Indians. In fact, so abundant were the sturgeon that they often leaped 

 into the canoes of the Indians, "as many of them do still (1722) every 

 year into the boats of the English." 2 A letter from William Penn to 

 the Free Society of Traders in 1683 names sturgeon first in the list of 

 abundant fish in the waters of his province. 3 Throughout the region 

 bordering on Delaware River and Bay the early settlers were struck at 

 the immense number of sturgeon seen in those waters and here, as in 

 Virginia, many and often fanciful stories are told about the fish being 

 so numerous that they jumped into open boats. Even as late as 1850 

 it was not an uncommon occurrence for passengers on the ferry to see 

 several sturgeon during a single trip between Camden and Philadelphia. 

 In the Great Lakes, on the Pacific coast, in Maine and southward 

 from the Chesapeake, the records tell the same story of sturgeon in 

 wonderful abundance. Yet, strange as it may seem, in those days of 

 none too abundant food supply, the sturgeon apparently was not often 

 eaten until many years after the colonies were established. It is not 

 known just when this species was first made the object of a regular 

 fishery. The unsuccessful Virginia experiment in 1626 was un- 

 doubtedly the first attempt. But after the abandonment of that ven- 

 ture there is no record of a regular sturgeon fishery until more than a 

 century later. There is a tradition that before the revolution market- 



1 Burk, J. D., " History of Virginia," Vol. II., p. 17. 



2 Beverley, Robert, "History of Virginia," pp. 117-119. 

 8 Watson, J. F., " Annals of Philadelphia," p. 46. 



