THE WHALING INDUSTRY 695 



prevent solid packing of the material. The oil is of poor quality— high free fatty 

 acid and high color. 



Both methods of cooking predominate at old shore stations, and the cooked 

 and pressed meat is handled in the regular press and the fish-reduction type dehy- 

 drator. Generally the press is of the continuous screw type, which handles the 

 wet, sticky meat less well than the apple-type press of 2 canted, perforated plates. 

 Dehydration is usually done in a long, large, cylindrical, canted, flame dehydrator 

 which, as it revolves, passes the wet coarse meat from the slightly higher flamed 

 end along its baffle plates to the lower end. After this process the meat is in the 

 form of a lumpy dried meal. 



Meat should be fresh. The oil in meat deteriorates much faster than oil in 

 blubber, and the meat itself becomes so slimy and clayey that the presses can 

 hardly handle it and the dehydrator cannot perform efiiciently. However, raising 

 the flame too high to handle difficult meat or to dry it thoroughly makes a grave 

 fire hazard. 



The oil content of whale meat is rarely above 10 per cent, except in late preg- 

 nant females when it goes to 25 or 30 per cent; frequently it is below 5 per cent. 

 Lean meat will actually absorb oil if any fat from blubber scraps, viscera, or 

 groove blubber is intermixed. In such cases the oil content of the meal may rise 

 to 10 or 12 per cent, causing it to dry and grind with difficulty and to become 

 rancid in storage. Fat content in meat of less than 3 per cent is not considered 

 recoverable. 



Factory ships formerly discarded the meat, cooked or uncooked, but lately 

 have been saving much of it for fresh food, meat extract, and powdered meal. 

 For meal, the meat is usually minced, simmered for a short time at low tempera- 

 ture (below 100° C), and then passed through step or shelf dehydrators after the 

 small amount of oil has been separated from the top of the cook. It is then ground 

 and sacked, and transferred to transport ship at sea. Even later methods can 

 by-pass the production of oil and meat extract and mince and dry in vacuo before 

 grinding and sacking. There is a close inverse relationship between the water and 

 the oil content of whale meat, which allows the latter to be quickly determined 

 by a fast test for the former and extrapolation. This can be done in 15 to 30 

 minutes before the carcass passes from the flensing deck forward to the meat 

 deck. Today only the raw meat of sperm whales can be legally discarded. 



Bones have a high oil content and must be utilized by law (except flippers). 

 The ribs and flipper bones are usually disarticulated; the vertebrae disarticulated 

 or sawed; and the skull sawed with a steam saw. 



Bones cannot be easily broken up on account of their size and the incredible 

 hardness of some in the skull; consequently, they must be cooked in a pressure 

 cooker. They are dumped helter-skelter in the old batch pressure cooker, and do 

 not need grids because plenty of air spaces remain among the bones. They are 

 steamed under 55 to 60-pounds pressure for 18 to 24 hours. The oil passes off 

 continuously. When fresh material is cooked without being overheated, the result- 

 ing oil is of good grade. Too much meat adhering to the bone, especially from 

 a rotted carcass, deteriorates the oil, as does too much pressure. The large chunks 

 of bone are extracted by hand when the digester has cooled. The latest device 

 for cooking bone is the rotary batch digester. This resembles the rotary continuous 

 digester for blubber, except that there are no precookers and the digester must 



