Paddlefish Caviar Advisory Issued It’s Bad News for Ohio River Market

By ROGER ALFORD, Associated Press writer

FRANKFORT, Ky. – Kentucky officials issued an advisory on Wednesday urging only limited consumption of paddlefish caviar from the Ohio River because it may be contaminated with chemicals.

The news could be bad for fishermen benefiting from the booming market for paddlefish caviar, which has come into demand because of its similarities in taste, look and consistency to sturgeon eggs.

Three Kentucky agencies joined together to issue the fish consumption advisory, saying pregnant women, women of childbearing age and children should eat no paddlefish flesh or eggs from the river because they contain elevated levels of mercury, chlordane and the cancer-causing chemical polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs.

“Most people who consume caviar eat only a small amount, but, still, our recommendation for this special population is for no consumption,” said Guy F. Delius, assistant director of the Kentucky Division of Public Health Protection and Safety.

Others should eat no more than six meals per year.

Paddlefish and their eggs have made Kentucky’s list of contaminated fish every year since at least 1999. The latest advisory listed a number of Ohio River fish species that should be eaten only on a limited basis because of contaminants, but paddlefish and their eggs were of special concern, Delius said. The advisory involves only the stretch of Ohio River along Kentucky’s northern border.

Indiana has a less restrictive advisory on paddlefish, recommending its residents eat no more than one meal per month because of contaminants found in fatty tissue and eggs.

The most prized source of caviar is the beluga sturgeon, found in the basins of the Black and Caspian seas. But overzealous fishing recently prompted the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to declare the beluga a threatened species.

As beluga have become rare, the market for North American caviar has grown, including that from the paddlefish, named for its long, paddlelike snout. James Tidwell, chairman of Kentucky State University’s aquaculture program, said Ohio River caviar is sold across the nation.

Paddlefish, among the largest fish in the United States, can weigh more than 200 pounds by feeding on zooplankton from the water. Paddlefish have been used for years for their eggs, which are marketed as valuable caviar.

Mark Marraccini, spokesman for the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources, said commercial fishing accounts for most of the state’s annual paddlefish catch.

One paddlefish can yield as much as $800 worth of eggs, and annual income for those who catch them can range from $100,000 to $400,000, according to the Indiana Department of Natural Resources.

Wildlife officials in Indiana arrested 12 people last month for catching paddlefish from Ohio River tributaries, a violation of state law. In Indiana, commercial fishermen can catch paddlefish from the main stem of the Ohio River, not from tributaries.

Those arrested were charged with illegal sale of a wild animal, money laundering and commercial fishing in closed water.

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