The Saint Paul globe., 1904-12-18
BLACK FOX PELI
RAREST OF SKINS
Only a Few Taken in This
Country and They Bring
$1,000 Apiece

BANGOR, Me, Dec. 17.-"The price OF
raw furs. says Bangor dealer, who has
been in the business for more than forty
years, lis about % per cent less than last
season. This is due to the Russo-Jap
anese war and trade complications else
where. For instance, 1 am paying So to
50. so now for fox skins which cost me
$SsSo and 81 in 1903, though the rate for
very choice and thick silver gray and
black fox pelts is advancing all the time
Good to fair silver grays are bringing from
$20e to $500, according to quality, though
pure gray is hardly profitable at $50.
The best silver grays. which are coal black
except for a patch of gray ON the runap
near the tail. are worth $500 or more.
These foxes are very rare. so that count
it lucky year when | buy three of them.
The most precious fur worn by any
animal is obtained from the black fox, q
prime pelt being valued at from $500 to
81, 200 Not one hunter in fifty ever saw
a black fox. They are no larger than a
common red fox, and there is no anatemi-
cal conformation to distinguish one from
! the other. The skins are of the same
! quality. and all the difference between the
! two lies in the color of the hair Take
| the red hair from common fox and re-
place it with black and you increase the
worth of the pelt by 5000 or 1900 per
| cent When scientific men can do that
| black fox skins.
During my forty years in the business
1 have purchased from three to four skins
from black foxes. They all came from
the east side of Penobscot river. In fact
| both the black and the silver gray seldom
| go west of the Penobscot. They are found
in Hancock Washington and Aroostook
counties in Maine, in northern New
! Brunswick, and thence north to Labrador.
keeping rather close to the sea coast. L
| have not bought a skin from black fox
| for ten years, though there are few such
! foxes still running at large. If l knew
Just where they were I would take
| week off and try and shoot one
In the gross amount OF money pald OUT
muskrat skins rank next to foxes IN I'M
! portance Last year l paid 10 cents for
| November skins and 25 cents for skins
| taken in March, This season am paying
| 10 cents for autumn pelts and nope TO De
| able to give Is cents in March. Nearly all
of them are trapped by boys along near by
| streams. 1t hardly pays the trappers 10
/ bring them down from the remote woods.
| They use very much muskrat meat for
bait and for their own eating. however,
and when they find an exceptionally good
pelt they bring 1t along. The rest are
| used in camp making mittenS and put
! ting patches on garments. BUY from
| 5000 to 5000 muskrat skins year. They
| go to Germany, where they are dyed ana
| made up into furs, which are SOLD unaer
| various fanciful names
about 10,000 mink and from lO0 TO lou
otter are taken in Maine every season.
| These are caught along streams ana eii
| the margins of lakes and ponds all over
the state Some of the finest otter SKINS
| I have ever purchased came from PuSnaw
lake, eight miles from Bangor. Mlnks are
1 found where muskrats abound, as the Iof-
mer feed upon the latter. Otter skins are
worth from $40 to SIS, according to quai-
ity. Mink are worth from 81 to "a.
"T still buy a few skunks every year,
| though the price has fallen off so that few
| care to capture them. The pelts are worth
| from 10 cents to $3.50, according to the
| amount of black color there is in their
| makeup, a pure black being worth 81 30
'.Skins of the fisher come in every win
| ter Perhaps there are 500 captured III
| Maine every year. They are worth from
| sa to Sc. which is 50 less than last year.
| Most of the fisher pelts go to China
''Of sable pelts there are few taken:
| Some years I get two or three lots, ano
| again | may wait two winters without
| receiving a specimen. They are worth
| from $3.50 to S..
| "In spite of the hair-lifting stories told
| in the sporting papers about loup GER
| yiers. am convinced that there are not
| any in Maine. I have not bought single
| snecimen for FIVE years, and hunters upon
| whose word / can rely tell me they have
| seen none The terrible Indian devils.
of which we see so much in print, are
| plain bobcats. The loup cervier. or Can
| ada lynx. has followed the wolf and the
| panther, and is no longer resident OF
Maine. Bobcats are still plentiful, and
will furnish stories enough to keep the
reading public interested for years tc
come The skin of a good loup cerv1el
is worth from 81 to IS. I can buy al
the bobcat pelts 1 want for 81 EACH"