What is cod?
"Cod- A species of fish well too known to require any description. It is amazingly prolific. Leewenhoek counted 9,384,000 eggs in a cod-fish of a middling size- a number that will baffle all the efforts of man to exterminate." -J. Smith Homans and J. Smith Homans, Jr., editors, Cyclopedia of Commerce and Commercial Navigation, New York, 1858
- Gadus morhua
- Three foot long fish living in the North Atlantic region
- Omnivorous
- Fecund- meaning very reproductive
- Impervious to disease
- Impervious to cold waters as cod produces a type of "antifreeze" that keeps them warm
"It has been calculated that if no accident prevented the hatching of the eggs and each egg reached maturity, it would take only three years to fill the sea so that you could walk across the Atlantic dryshod on the backs of cod." -Alexandre Dumas, Le Grande Dictionnaire de cuisine, 1873