•214 
THE MEDITERRANEAN NATURALIST 
The Tunny Fishery in Sicily & Sardinia. 
“Neptunia” contains a well written article with 
the above title by G. Hiitterott of which the fol- 
lowing is a brief abstract. 
The tunny fishery in Italy during the last four 
years has yielded on an average 2,000,000 francs a 
year. Forty-two tunny stations have been at work 
with the following results. 
| hundredweight, represent a value of 1,440,000 
francs without reckoning the value of the fish oil 
extracted from the bones, or of the manure into 
which the bones are afterwards made. The two 
stations, that belong to the .Marchese di Genova 
were bought with the islands of Favignana. 
Formica, and Marittima many years ago by Comm. 
Florio for the sum of million francs the two 
tunny stations being estimated at 1,400,000 francs. 
1889 
1888 
1887 
13 off the coast of Tireno 
150,000 francs 
120,000 francs 
175,000 francs 
^ n v> 
„ „ Mar .Jonio 
20,000 „ 
37,000 „ 
35,000 „ 
22 „ „ 
„ „ Sicily 
1,120,000 „ 
775,000 „ 
1,080,000 „ 
fi » „ 
„ „ Sardinia 
710,000 ,, 
1,268,000 „ 
1,268,000 „ 
No tunny fishery is carried on off the Italian 
coast in the Adriatic. The most important is the 
Sardinian fishery, especially that of the island of 
Piana, of Porto Scuso, of Porto Paglia, of Flumen- 
torcio, of Cala Yinagra near Cagliari and of the 
salt works near Maddalena; after which comes the 
Sicilian, of which the fisheries conducted at Favi- 
gnana and Formica near Trapani, of Scopello, 
Solanto and St. Elia near Palermo, of Milazzo and 
Oliveri near Messina, of Marzameni and of Cape 
Passero near Catania are the principal. 
These stations, some of which date back to very 
ancient times, give an average of more than 1000 
hundredweight of fish each, while many of them 
greatly exceed that number, producing oftentimes 
several thousands of hundredweights. At the 
two tunny stations of Favignana and of Formica 
near Trapani in Sicily, the latter of which is of 
but minor importance, are taken during a season 
consisting of a month or five weeks, an average 
of 6000 fish of an average weight of ISO kilos 
each; and a few years ago as many as 17,000 were 
captured during one season at these two stations. 
Reckoning the average weight of a fish as being 
180 kilos, then 15,000 fish would weigh 27,000 
hundredweight, and calculating their value at the 
low rate of 30 francs a hundredweight we obtain 
the sum of 810,000 francs. 
From these two tunny stations there has been 
brought during one season to Genoa — the principal 
tunny market in Italy — 12,000 hundredweights .of 
tunny preserved in oil, which at 120 francs a 
Florio introduced many important changes, from 
which he now realizes handsome profits. There 
are several other examples, equally striking, where 
the introduction of improved apparatus and 
methods has met with equal success and large 
sums of money are being made. 
All of the tunny fisheries commence operations 
when the fish are migrating, excepting the stations 
at the east of Sicily where operations are also 
continued during the months of July and August 
when the fish all returning. The latter time is 
not so productive as is the former. 
Since 1878 the Italian fishermen, especially those 
of Genoa, have gone annually to the coasts of 
Spain and Portugal to fish for tunny. 
The fish is afterwards preserved in oil at esta- 
blishments near Cadice in Spain, and at Yillareale 
in Portugal which have been built by and are 
directed by Genoese merchants, after which the 
fish so preserved is shipped to Genoa. 
The fish taken off the Spanish and Portugese 
coast are not of sc fine a quality as are those that 
are fished from Sicilian and Sardinian waters, a 
fact that is evidently due to the penchant that the 
larger fish have for deep waters, while the smaller 
ones keep near the shore. 
The average weight of a fish taken off the Spanish 
coast is but 1 20 chilograms, while the Sardinian 
fish average 150 chilograms each, and the fish from 
Sicily 180 chilograms. 
The author then proceeds to give some interest- 
ing details regarding the market prices of the 
