278 BULLETIN OF THE UNITED STATES FISH COMMISSION. 
retained for the less critical home market. The import duties paid to the German 
Government by packers of the American product is about 18 cents a pound, and the 
amount of the tax thus paid into the Imperial Treasury of the German Empire must be 
considerable, since a single dealer, operating on the Delaware during the season of 
1888, put up about 50 tons of it for the German market. The principal port of entry 
for this product into the European market is Hamburg. 
The caviare produced tVom the lake sturgeon {Aci/penser rubicundus) is said to be 
the best, the eggs being soinewbat larger than those of the common species, A. sturio. 
The whole of the caviare produced upon the eastern coast of the United States is made 1 
from the roes of A. sturio., the short-nosed species, A. brevirostris, not being found in 
sufficient numbers or size to make it an object to collect its roes for caviare. Caviare 
is also prepared from the A. transniontanus, white sturgeon, Columbia Kiver, or Sacra- 
mento sturgeon as it is variously called, although this industry is not yet conducted 
upon so extensive a scale upon the Pacific as upon the Atlantic coast. The roe of the 
green sturgeon, A. medirostris., of the west coast, does not seem to be used for caviare. 
The white sturgeon is the largest, rivaling in size the common eastern sturgeon, while 
the lake sturgeon is smaller, not usually much exceeding 100 pounds in weight. ■ 
On the eastern coast the Delaware River and Bay is now the principal resort of the j 
common sturgeon and the seat of the only profitable fishery of this species, unless the 
Florida sturgeon should prove to be the same form. The amount of capital invested 
in boats, nets, and small sloops engaged in this business on the Delaware is very con- ! 
siderable. The experience of the dealers and fishermen shows that a steady falling oft' 
has occurred in the catch within a few years. This, coupled with the circumstance 
that the fishery is now only profitably conducted south of Wilmington and that the 
Delaware now has the only profitable sturgeon fishery north of Florida, is sufficient 
to prove that it is high time that something was being done to stay the extinction of 
this fish. The total value and enormous yield of eggs of the Delaware fishery may be 
inferred from the fact that a single caviare packer collected and shipped, as stated 
above, about 50 tons of this product to Europe during the season of 1888. The great ' 
demand for the caviare has, within a very recent period, made the fishery profitable 
to the fishermen, many of whom own their boats and gill-nets. From all the informa- 
tion that I can gather, it is safe to assume that the annual value of the sturgeon fishery 
of the Delaware must be somewhere between $100,000 and $200,000 per annum. This 
industry may be maintained by prompt and efficient action, and to this end it is the 
hope of the writer that the foregoing account of experiments, results, and observations 
may successfully contribute. The only means of maintaining and increasing this 
industry is through the artificial propagation of this fish, which I have every reason 
to think may be successfully accomplished at a comparatively insignificant outlay. 
