Classification
Family: Gadidae; Species: Gadus morhua
Common names
codfish, rock cod, scrod, northern cod, morue franche,
morue commune, morue de l'Atlantique, ovak, uugak
Physical traits and habits
- Cod are heavy bodied fish with large heads, 3 dorsal fins,
2 anal fins, and an almost square caudal (tail) fin.
- Their scales are small and smooth.
- Cod can weigh up to 90 kilograms, but usually average 3 -
4 kilograms.
- Depending of the bottom type and area, cod range in colour
from grey and green to brown, blackish or even red. Their heads
and bodies are covered with brown to reddish spots
- The rings from a tiny bone in a cod's head, the otolith,
tells a cod's age
- Cod are migratory fish, that mainly feed on other fishes
and various invertebrates. Among their culinary delights are
clams, squids, mussles, echinoderms, comb jellies, sea squirts,
worms and even unlucky seabirds. Cod are cannibals and can be
eaten at various life stages by various other fishes, seals and
whales.
Range
Cod are known as groundfish since they live in the ocean's bottom
layers. They occur on both sids of the North Atlantic. Off the
North American portion, they range from Cape Hatteras, North Carolina,
to the Hudson Strait, off western Greenland. Newfoundland - particularly
off the Grand Banks - and Labrador have typically been home to
the greatest abundance of the fish.
Economic uses
Cod is valued for food, liver oil and other products. The fish
can be sold fresh, frozen, salted and smoked while some are turned
into sticks, blocks and fillets and others are used in fish meal
and glue production. Cod cheeks and cod tongues are also considered
delicacies.
(Sources: Cod: A biography of the fish that changed the
world, by Mark Kurlansky, Alfred A. Knopf Canada, 1997; The
Encyclopedia of Canadian Fishes, by B.W. Coad with H. Waszczuk
and I. Labingnan, Key Porter, 1995; Canadian Encyclopedia, Hurtig
Publishers, 1988; Encyclopedia Britannica, 1974.)
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