Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-01-28
Raising Blue Fox Furs.

About ten years ago a group of gentle
men connected with the Alaska Commercial
Company leased four uninhabited islands in
south Alaska from the government, paying
500 year, and stocked each OF them with
twenty pairs of blue fox cubs. Their idea
was to raise furs for the market. Cabins
We're built, and two men with their fami-
lies were placed each island to look
after the animals. They were ex-sailors
who had married native women and were
paid salaries of $1,000 and $1,000 year,
and furnished with a certain amount of
supplies, food and light They were visited
twice year by supply steamer, which
carried flour, hams and bacon, timed meats
and vegetables, candles and kerosene, am
munition- and other articles
The animalsowere allowed to run wild
like Texas cattle. but came into the cabins
and We're fed twice day. They were given
corn meal mush, dried fish and dried sea
lion beef, which was obtained from the
neighboring islands. They bred rapidly, with
filters of from three to eleven cubs the
average being about five to the litter The
pups are delicate and the mortality has
been great reducing the annual increase
to about 300 per cent. The male cubs are
killed at two years of age, in December of
each year, and from 400 to 1000 raw skins
are sent annually to San Francisco and
from there to London, where they are sold
at the regular March auction, conducted by
the furriers' association.
The company has now about 1000 foxes
upon the four islands. but the enterprise
has been a commercial failure because blue
fox fur is not fashionable. There is not
enough of it TO make a feature, and the
principal demand is in China, Siberia and
western Russia More blue fox skins are
sold in Irkutsk, Siberia. than in Paris. The
blue fox muffs and hoas offered in the
American market made from wildcat
skins, picked and dyed If it We're possible
to raise enough skins to induce the fash
Tor able furriers to start a craze the blue
fnY nn hos in iaS lS jphf hn do IN
pay, but since they were started the prices
of the raw skins have dropped from $50
and $50 to 81 and SIS each.
In order to learn how to protect the young
foxes from disease and accident the COM
pany has sent six pairs of breeding foxes to
the Geological Gardens at Washington, and
the biologists are experimenting with them.
Profitable Animal Raising.
Several men have made animal raising a
successful and profitable business. Walter
C. Howard, farmer at Randolph Center,
VT, raises foxes in pens like pigs. and has
been successful He kills his animals when
they are about two years old and sells for
500 and $50 each the raw skins of the foxes,
which cost him only from 50 to So to raise.
The most successful breeder, however, has
been Charles Dalton of Tignish, Prince Ed
ward Island, who has produced strain Of
beautiful royal black" foxes from the ordi-
nary silver gray species The skins are
all sold to the royal families of Russia at
enormous prices. The animals are not much
larger than cat or fox terrier. One skin
will make small collarette or a muff, while
ten or twelve skins are necessary for a cape
of ordinary size. A few years ago he sold
single skin for $500, and last year he
sold one skin for 81, 700. His crop is not
large, however. He has seven pairs of
breeders, and gets from thirty to forty cubs
each year. But two-thirds of them do not
survive infancy. Last year he was able to
send but twelve skins to market, which he
sold at an average of $500 each. This year
he has eleven equally perfect skins. He
kills the cubs when two years old, and 1t
costs him from 50 to So to raise cub.
There are no royal black fox skins in the
market. AS fast as they appear they are
snapped up by agents of the imperial fami-