Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1892-02-03
BULL-FROGS AND SYAILS:

There are two new additions to the
list of profitable products of the farm
which promise to find employment for
many farmers who have the REQUISITE
, facilities. These are due to foreign no
! tions and tastes imported chiefly from
France and Germany along with the
numerous adopted citizens who hail
from those European shores. One ia
the grenoalte, so called by the French,
who esteem it as a choice article foI
the exercise of culinary skill. 1t is now
served up at the first hotels and restau-
rants in the large cities, New York
especially, and appears in the markets
as regular article of sale. The ami
mal is easily bred and reared, and feeds
itself and thrives most abundantly in
marshes. The other is called eScargot,
and is used for making stews and soups,
but is eaten also boiled and roasted.
This animal is also easily reared. and
requires no feeding, but does better
when a pasture is provided for it.
known in common parlance, the first
as the frog and the other as the snail,
these readily acclimated animals have
never until now been considered as Of
any value, but no doubt hereafter will
furnish special business here, as they
have done for many years in Europe,
to thousands of farmer.
The French frog farm is much like
one of our cranberry meadows--a swamp
laid out in broad bitches with grassy
banks between them. We remember
years ago passing one of these farms in
the vicinity of large French city in
the early evening, and being drawn to
notice it by the deafening music from
the thousands of fat fellows sitting in
the damp grass and now and then
splashing into the bitches and cOntinu-
ing to sing their lays as they protruded
their snOutS just above the surface of
the water. These frogs were special
breed, Rend eSculentd by name, but diff
fering very little from our handsome,
slender specimen found in marshes,
and having bright green and brown
spotted skin. Our common bullfrog is
said TO be quite as delicate in flavor,
and more acceptable in point of meat,
than the eSculent species of Europe,
and as the natural stock of them is fast
disappearing before the nets of the
hunters thousands are now imported
from Canada for the supply of the New
Y ork market. Consequently the time
has come for the skilled culture of
them in connection with other aquatic
products, as brook trout, carp, bass,
and other fish, or water creSs, which
can be grown conjunctively, and are
very profitable.
The esculent snail is of various kinds,
one inhabits damp meadows and is
fed upon lettuce. Indeed, there are
several varieties of these, judging from
the character of their shells, which in
habit fresh water, or rather the banks
of fresh water streams, and the low
greasy meadows adjoining. At least
one kind is damien of the salt water,
and is found in the mud of tidal,
estuaries, and as the ''periwinkle, - is
largely consumed by Europeans and
even by the English people. This latter
species is boiled in salt water, and as
the small, spiral-Shaped animal is drawn
from its shell usually by means of a
strong pin, the common name of il is
the ''pinpatch." An eScdrgerie is quite
a well conducted establishment in
France, and is always surrounded by
a close, safe fence to keep the stock
from wandering abroad and getting
lost. 1t Is commonly sOwn with clover,
lettuce, rape, and other tender herb
age, upon which the snails feed, and is
laid out with narrow paths for ease in
gathering the daily supply which is sent
to market.