Improvements in or relating to the production of fish meal

669,597. Fish meal. AKTIESELSKABET ATLAS. July 22, 1949, No. 19313/49. Class 49. In a process for the production of fish meal from whole fish and/or from waste from the production of filleted and preserved fish, the starting material is freed from fins, skin, blood, entrails and is separated into flesh and bone components by impact thereon of jets of water, steam or air after which the flesh components are dried to 10-30 per cent moisture and ground, the product preferably being further dried to 5 per cent moisture. In an example 1000 Kgs. of cod are washed in cold water, immersed for 15 sees. in boiling water before treating in a rotary perforated drum under a water spray to remove the fins, skin and blood. The entrails and gills are then removed and after washing in cold water the material is coagulated in boiling water for 15 mins. and then treated with a shower of water in a rotary perforated drum to separate the flesh and bones, the former being filtered off and dried in an ordinary drying plant to about 20 per cent, stored for about three, days in a silo and then ground in an edge-runner mill the product being further dried by infra-red irradiation to below 5 per cent moisture. Grinding is preferably effected when the material is moist by beating, rubbing, rasping or scraping or combinations thereof whereby the fibres that stick together are separated without being ground into a dust-like powder. The perforated drums may be replaced by shaking tables, boxes or channels.