Australian: Whale barf puts family in money
WHEN Loralee Wright and her husband Leon discovered a foul-smelling lump on a South Australian beach this month she refused to sully her car with it. Told two weeks later their find was a piece of precious ambergris - spawned from a massive whale vomit more than a decade earlier, and greatly prized for its use in perfume - they scurried back to find it. Now the beachcombing pair are waiting to field offers on the rare discovery, which could net them up to $500,000. "It still seems sort of surreal," Ms Wright said yesterday.
...Fisheries expert Ken Levy...said ambergris was released by 1 per cent of sperm whales around the world. "It usually results from a massive belch from a whale which can be heard for kilometres away," he said. Mr Levy said ambergris had been a sought-after substance dating back to 1000BC, used as a trading commodity in Europe and China. It has has been used as a fixative for fine perfumes, for medicinal purposes and also as an aphrodisiac. It also has been used to enhance the flavours of food and wine, and for herbal and homeopathic remedies. "To start with, it still has a faeces-like odour," Mr Levy said. "But over years it floats on the ocean and is worked on by the sun and the water, until it has only a very sweet, musky fragrance that is a key component in making perfume."
