The swordfish caught in the waters off Cape Cod, Massachusetts may be the only mercury free swordfish in the world. You may ask why you haven't heard about this before. The reason is, until now, the old Cape fishermen have carefully guarded the secret of how they get their swordfish mercury free....handing it down from generation to generation.

You're aware, of course, of all the talk about the mercury in the New England rain. They say there's four times the acceptable amount in what comes down on both Rhode Island and Massachusetts. Connecticut though, which you'd think would get the same kind of rain, says its rain has less mercury than the government allows. That's hard to figure. It may be a yarn.

When this mercury laced rain falls into the water it gets into the fish. When we eat the fish, particularly swordfish, the mercury gets into us. That's why we're repeatedly told "don't eat too much swordfish." Just as it is with too much lead, too much mercury in the human body is toxic. If we can believe the scientists who keep track of all this stuff, the problem of mercury in the swordfish isn't getting any better.

Now, probably, you're like me, you love a perfectly broiled piece of swordfish. However, all of these warnings about eating too much swordfish have you more than a little bit concerned. Every time you bite into a nice swordfish steak, the thought of those warnings takes away a lot of the enjoyment of the meal. That's why you'll be elated when I tell you what I recently heard from an old Cape Cod fisherman. The fisherman tells about how they've solved the mercury problem in the swordfish that they catch in the waters off the Cape.

Now, as they say down on the fishing docks of the Cape, you may have a hard time hoisting this story aboard, but if you think about it long enough, it seems to make sense. What the sea-seasoned old Cape Cod salts do when they land a swordfish is to hang it, head up, in a freezer. As the swordfish get colder and colder all of the mercury in the fish starts to drops lower and lower until, when it gets to about zero degrees, all the mercury in that swordfish has plunged pretty much down into the tail. That's when the fishermen cut off that tail and that's why Cape Cod swordfish is mercury free.

Now I can't swear that this is true. I simply tell it to you the way it was told to me by an old Cape Cod fishermen who says it's so. You can make up your own mind. Just as you can make up your own mind about those Connecticut people who say, they don't have as much mercury in their rain as the rest of New England.

Learn more about this author, Bishop Taylor.
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