Birmingham state herald. (Birmingham, Ala.) 1895-1897, 1896-05-03
Mss SELDEN'S FROG FARM
A Girl Adopts a Novel and Prof.
table Pursuit.
RAISED FROGS FOR MARKET
Enjoys an Income of Several thousand Year
From Twenty Acres of Bog-Her
Business Methods.


When the frog business is carried on
right it pays, as is proved by the expert
ence of Miss Mona Selden of Burlington
county, New Jersey, who has been fur
nishing frogs to the Philadelphia and
New York markets for five years, and
besides having a regular trade estab-
lished has. stored away in the bank
enough dollars to see her through a spell
of sickness If it should happen to be a
long one
Seven years ago Miss Selden was a
school teacher, earning about $40 week
in the country districts, where, during
the winter terms, she was obliged to
teach and keep on their good behavior
boys who were big enough and strong
enough to pick her up with one hand
and hang her on a hat rack.
She was plucky and managed to keep
school wherever she undertook it, but
the strain on her was too great and she
was told that she must give up the occu-
patton. What should she do? That was
the question that worried her. She had
saved about $500, enough to start her in
some small business, but she didn't know
how to do any thing but teach school.
She went to New York to visit friends
and while there she one day visited a
market and saw dozens of frogs hung
up. Sne inquired the price of them,
found that they came high, and immedi-
ately got the idea that she could make
money raising frogs
She came back to Friendship. The
country surrounding the town Is dotted
with marshes and small ponds that dur
ing the spring and summer seasons, are
full of frogs of all sizes. This land was
considered of little value and when Miss
Selden offered one of the owners 81 an
acre for twenty acres of some of the wet
test and boggiest of it he jumped at the
chance to sell 1t.
The first thing she did with the proper
ty was to fence it in. She had two
strands of wire fencing strung around it.
and when her purpose became known
to the neighbors they sat around the
stores nights and cracked jokes at her
expense. There was general impression
that she as crazy; few were kind
enough to think that she was foolish,
and occasionally person would turn up
with a defense for the alittle school
teacher who was calculated to know
what she was about the biggest part of
the time.
1t was late in the season when Miss
Selden finished the job of fencing, and
she spent the winter in reading every
thing she could get hold of that told
about frogs, and when she wasn't read
Ing she was out in Nate Umplehie's barn
shooting at mark with target rifle. +.
When spring broke and the frog season
opened the girl could PUNK bulls eye
at sixty PAGES every time and she wasn't
calculated to miss frogs head If 1t was
within reasonable shooting distance. She
appeared on the street one morning clad
IN short coat that dropped to her knees
and a pair of hip hunting boots. A
game bag hung over her shoulder, there
was a cartridge belt around her waist
ana her head was covered with a can
vas hat. In her hand she carried rifle.
A good many who saw her concluded
that the woman had reached the climax
of lunacy, others saw that her idiocy had
made wonderful progress during the
winter, while others, mostly women,
We're so shocked that they could only
ihe curtains,
Miss Selden didn't bother her head
about what her neighbors thought. Her
small hoard of money was dwindlng
away and she wanted to find out whether
her venture was going to pan out or not
She spent the day in the bog that she
had bought, and at night brought>in 300
frogs She Immediately shipped them to
New York dealer and at the end of
the week received check showing her
that her first days work on the frog
patch had Melted her upward of $10
She worked hard that season and mans
aged to clean up in cold cash $500.
When her success became known to the
people of Friendship they began to show
idiocy, and frog hunters blossomed out
in every family the following season.
With her eyes for any opportunity to
increase her income, Miss Selden saw an
opportunity to make money money by
buying frogs from other hunters. This
she did She bought shrewdly, kept
track of the market, and at the end of
the second season found herself about
$4,000 better off than she was the year
before
II
young woman's health as well as her
bank account and she built herself one
of the neatest and prettiest houses to be
found in Burlington county. There she
spends the greater part of the time dur
ing the winter, turning to literary
work. and while she does this for pleas
ure, it has brought her substantial COM
pensation in the form of checks, and she
has become contributor under a. half
dozen pen names to several of the lead
ing literary publications in the country.
Since Miss Selden turned her attention
to buying frogs she has spent less time
hunting, but occasionally she goes out
for a day in the bog and comes home
with full bag. The twenty acres that
she bought she holds as preserve, and
ten acres of 1t she has turned into
breeding place for frogs.
She calculates that every spring there
are about 10000 frogs in the breeding
ground. She feeds them and they are
furnished with clear water from a con-
tinuajiy flowing stream. Under the
treatment that the woman gives them
the frogs thrive and grow to enormous
proper tons. The largest are kept in the
e'ranche" The medum-sized are taken
for the market, because they are the ten
derest juclest and sweetest, and they
command higher price than the larger
ones.
In her home Miss Selden has a large
aquarium, in which she keeps fish and
frogs. They are her only pets, and they
seem to have an affection for her. The
fish eat from her hand, allow her to take
them out of the water and undergo the
discomfort of being in the open air with
out making any objection. The frogs are
on more familiar terms with her than
are the fish, and they have their hours
when they are given the freedom of the
house. One big green fellow named Dick
is A years old, and when Miss Selden is
writing he sits on the table near her and
amuses himself with boxing scraps of
paper around or chasing flies.
Dick has been trained to do great
many interesting tricks. He will hop