Hello,
When I was a child, I remember a short trip to the shore of Lake Michigan (very large lake in northern US). It was a bright moonlit night in early spring, and we waded in with a 5 gallon bucket and a large hand net with a fine mesh. I held the bucket while my father dipped his net. The water was very cold! There were many people like us - up and down the beach as far as I could see in either direction - it was a festival kind of atmosphere. In about 10 minutes, we had a couple of gallons of minnows. We poured off the water and added couple of gallons of ice. Most of them were about 1 1/2 inches long. The largest was about 3 inches long.
Returning home, we rolled the little minnows in cornmeal and garlic salt, and fried them in bacon grease. I am now 50 years old, and those little minnows still remain the best tasting fish I have ever eaten! The larger ones were gutted first, but all were fried with their heads, scales and tails on - and they were wonderful (bones and all). Some of the larger fish contained roe, and the adults in the group enjoyed that fried by itself.
We moved away from the lake and my father has since passed on. Were these shad? Are they related to the gizzard and threadfin shad we can grow here in the S.E. US? When I search the forums and google for shad recipes, most of the recipes I find are for catfish bait.
Do you think it is possible to develop a market for gourmet clupeidae?
Berry
But I do know of people who earn a living shad dipping with dip nets and sell to bait shops. They are schooling fish and you can tell a shad dipper just by looking at him... he has one arm 2 or 3 x the size of the other 