The Lee County journal. (Leesburg, Ga.) 1904-19??, 1907-05-10
Maine Ships a Million FLARES Every Winter
EATS ANOTHER MILLION AND STILL HAS
A SUPPLY
Frozen and sent to Market.

the law, trout and land-lQcked salmon
as well.
Steel traps are set along the borders
of streams and lakes for the taking of
mink and otter, and by the sides Of
abandoned wood roads for foxes and
loup ceryiers and when the older and
more experienced members are for
warding the work in hard, the boys
go hunting for spruce gum, which is
worth $3.50 pound at the drug stores
or for black ash hoop poles, which
bring cents apiece in the cooper
shops
BY the time one thousand or more
hares are taken and the store of fresh
provisions is running low one member
of the party goes to the nearest vii
lage to hire a horse and sled for the
purpose of taking the hares to the
railroads or steamboats,, and to bring
in fresh supplies from the markets and
grocery stores. And when the hunt
ing mechanism is once started and the
hares are coming in at the rate Of
one thousand a week, business goes
on at a gaining velocity all through
the winter, and until the oncoming
sun sends the sap aloft in the rock
maple trees and warns the workers
that it is time to take in their snares
and put out sap buckets for the max
ing of maple strip.
The busiest and most profitable time
of the year is during the holiday sea-
son, beginning ten days before Easter
and lasting three weeks:
1t is then that the small French-Ca-
madam boys and their larger Yankee
and Irish associates go to camp with
cheap guns and mongrel dogs and
hunt and feast and play and imagine
they are wild Indians, and, though
they are not so successful as hunters
as their elder and more sedate kin
dred,, they find far more enjoyment in
the outing than it is possible for any
adult to secure
Not only are immense numbers of
hares shipped from Maine every win
ter-many Of them going as far West
as Chicago and as far South as New
Orleans-but in the far North woods
of Aroostook county, where there are
many French-Canadian squatters,
whole families make a great part of
their winter living on hare pies and
hare stews, which, by using plenty OF
fat in the. cooking, make healthful and
nourishing diets for several thousand
industrious and prolific people, who at
no distant date will perhaps become
the dominant race in Maine.
None of the financial flurries which
and villages, sell their surplus stock
markets of the big cities was ever
known to affect the great hare indus
try of Maine. If the consuming cen
ters become oyerstocked with frozen
hares and the price drops below
cents per capita, the hunters load
their sleds with dead hares, and,
driving among the suburbs of cities
and villages, sell their surplus stock
to the poultrymen for or 4 cents
each And there is always market
for hares among the growers of poul-
try, because boiled hare meat, mixed
with Indian meal, and served hot, is
said to make the most stubborn hen
lay double-yolk eggs every day.
Another surprising feature in the
hare industry is that though nearly
every carniverous bird or animal that
runs wild-foxes, bobcats, loup GER
viers, minks, martens, raccoons, owls,
hawks and eagles finds the great
Northern hare its most reliable source
of food supply from September to May
and though 100000 hares are sent
from Maine yearly and as many more
are used in human economy at home
in spite of this enormous drain upon
the resources of a prolific race, which
has been going on for years and prom
Uses to continue indefinitely, instead
of diminishing or showing any deple-
ton, the supply of hares seems to be
gaining constantly. - Indianapolis
News.