THE POOR FISH: Or Bringing Home The Dinkum Oil

New Zealand Listener, Volume 9, Issue 234, 17 December 1943, Page 20

THE POOR FISH:

Or Bringing Home The Dinkum Oil

F you want shark liver oil you must first catch your shark, Even Mrs. Beeton would have known that. And although you may think that there is not the slightest chance of your ever wanting such a thing, you never can tell. Without a proper supply of vitamins, so we are told, we can’t remain healthy, and without fish liver oil we can’t build up supplies of vitamins A or D which, they say, prevent such things as night-blind-ness and rickets. And besides, fish oils are also needed for paints and varnishes and for feeding to stock. New Zealand scientists are experimenting with New Zealand fish to see what lies in their livers, because the war has put cod liver oil on the list of the near-unobtainables. They’d tried groper, ling, eel, and barracoota, some of which had proved richer*than the famous cod; so why not shark, they asked themselves. Why not indeed? All they needed was someone to catch the sharks. "We can get sharks in our harbours," it was decided. "Someone must go and catch them and cut:them up and bring home the livers. —

O this is the story of the young woman who brought home the catch. She had never been fishing before and she didn’t know anything about sharks, but she did know how to deal with fish livers. Before she went she overcame the second difficulty, She read up_ sharks, and memorised the details, so that by the time she went fishing she knew the 20 varieties inside out, almost. Then she set out with hooks, manila twine, a balance, jars, bottles of alcohol (not for consumption), a long sharp knife, and shorts. The weather was perfect where she went and the sea was gleaming against vivid white sand. So she was burned almost black in the four days she was there. She worked from a small launch staffed by two men who lived on the launch, while she lived with a lighthouse keeper and his wife. Every day they set out before seven o’clock and fished till it was dark. It was often 10 p.m. before the livers were safely stowed away. * * Ba FISHING calls for patience. It was very early in the season for sharks and those that were about didn’t bite much. The shark-fishers sat for hours and hours without a bite, and then the girl mostly got schnapper. But when at last she hooked a shark there was no mistaking its weight, or the way it leaped and tugged and floundered. She played it fearfully and up it came. The men grabbed nooses and slipped them round its gills and hoisted it on to the back of the boat. She wouldn’t go near its chopping jaws, but the men knew how to deal with it... After a‘while the girl grew skilful and the third day they caught 10 sharks. The largest one was seven feet. And, of course, there was one shark, a tremendous brute, well-hooked, which tossed and struggled till the three, all tightly pulling at the line, couldn’t hold it. It got | away; at least this is what they said. | Anyhow they caught sharks for four days, and at last had 14, * * * UT in the launch they lived on fish. before she took on this job the girl couldn’t stand the taste of fish. Or so she thought. But surprisingly enough, this fish tasted very good. The smell of (continued on next page)

(continued from previous page) its cooking drifted about in the air and mingled with the sunlight and the seafoam. The sea-gulls whirled around and screamed till it was a case of getting at the food before the birds. But when seven-foot sharks have been leaping and plunging on the end of your line anything tastes good. Luxury of luxuries. they also had stewed pears and thick cream. The sharks they caught were of two species-the School Shark (Galeorhinus australis) and the seven-gilled shark (Notorhynchus pectorosus). A strange thing about these fish was that the School Sharks were all females and the seven-gilled all males, which made it very interesting for the scientists. %* * %* ACH night at dusk they came back to earth. On the beach in the dark the girl rigged up the balance from the jetty and cut up the sharks by the light of a hurricane !emp on dinghies turned upside down. She discovered that sharks were the most beautiful things to cut up; for their insides were clean and shaded from pale mauve to deep purple. There was very little blood about. Mostly the livers weighed about eight pounds, and off each liver she took a two pound sample which she preserved in alcohol. The oil could be extracted with solvents. Shark liver oil, particularly that of the School shark, is very high in vitamin A and D content, but it is not as pleasant as cod liver oil. It has a very distinctive smell, and a taste of its own, not exactly unpleasant but very sickly. So much had been found out, but with these samples much more could be discovered. This was the first time any samples of male seven-gilled sharks had been taken in that locality, though female School sharks had been _caught not far away, and male and female had been taken from Cook Strait. Back in the laboratory, the staff act as guinea pigs and have a daily dose of the different liver oils. Soon she knew, she would be having her dose of sharkliver oil. But that was an anxiety she would meet when it came. The immediate task was to sort out and label her two-pound lots of liver and consign them by rail.

As we have said, you never can tell when you may be wanting shark liver oil; but now you won't have first to ‘catch your shark. This girl has done it — for you. , *