The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1908-06-14
WEALTH IN FROG FIRM
California Enterprise Owned
and Managed by a
Woman.

ranches in California is owned and
managed by Miss Katherine Walsh.
Like a good many other people now
living in the West, Miss Walsh was
forced to leave her native state in
the East because of ill health. Being
told to live out of doors and forced
by necessity to earn her own living.
she selected to raise frogs for the
market, and now not only owns one
of the most picturesque ranches in
Contra Costa county, but supports in
comfort her mother and the two child
rem of a dead sister.
1.-The net profit of my froggeries for
last year was something over 1880"
Miss Walsh told the reporter. Il sold
three thousand dozen frog legs in San
Francisco and that was the amount
cleared. They We're all shipped alive
to hotels and restaurants, and the
price received was from 81 to So a
dozen. Of course the price Of frog legs,
like that of every ether variety of
game, depends on the size and the
season.
CHEERFUL CANNIBALS.
1.-THE native green frog of California
is very small, and while the legs are
delicious in taste, they bring much
less money than when the native frog
is crossed with the large Eastern frog.
According to epicures the very best
frog for the table is the cross be-
tween the California and the Florida
ctr olr ic n0r
selected this cross produces exception
ally handsome frogs to look at and so
deliciously favored as to put to blush
the finest Partisan product.
MY froggeries cover ten acres of
land and are four in number, besides
the small pools where the tadpoles are
kept until they are large enough to
be put with their older relatives. Yes.
it is absolutely necessary to keep them
divided according to size, as frogs are
about the most cheerful cannibals one
could imagine.
Anything of his own kind, from a
tadpole up, is fair game for large
frog that can catch and swallow 1t.
They are not at all particular about
being able to swallow it at one gulp
either. Indeed, they are perfectly
content, if they can get portion of
their victim within reach of the di-
gestive fluids, to sit placidly with a
part hanging out of their mouth until
room has been made for it inside.
FROGS ARE GREAT TRAVELLERS.
In spite of every precaution the
large frogs will sometimes get out
When they do it seems that instinct
| leads them directly to the tadpole
pools In the morning the runaway
| frog is found wearing a placid smile
| of contentment, unmistakable evidence
| that a sufficiency of tadpoles have peer
| stored away in the miwdst of him.
| st now have all my ponds and pools
| surrounded by close board fences three
| feet in height. No, the frogs canno
| fump so high, but if by chance
| broom, a garden utensil, or even
| broken branch is left leaning agalns
| the fence the frogs seem to dlscoVe
i it in some miraculous manner and
once, using it as a gangplank, set GU
to see the world.
's'They are great travellers by nature
and soon after moving my stock I
this place I had an amusing experience
AS it was not possible to have bank
about my first froggeries, | had fence
built, but when | bought this rancf
as all the ponds had high banks,
thought there would be no necessit
for the fences.
"A few days after we moved in
was awakened early one morning b
the gardener and invited to come OF
and look at the frogs. It seemed as
the whole place was covered with then
They had climbed the banks and wei
off on their travels. We were keT
busy the entire morning sweepin
them up with brooms and dustpar
and dumping them back into tt
ponds.
4 GROWTH OF TADPOLES.
1.-THE pools for my tadpoles are nev'
| more than a foot deep, and have G.
: ment covered bottoms The frog poo
| are deeper. and the bottoms are CO
cred with mud. in which the frogs bul
| themselves during the winter.
| sAn my pools and ponds are SO pc
| | fectly drained that an overflow is qui
| | impossible, and in case it becomes ne
| essary all the water can be let c
within a few minutes. They are a
| ponds and pools, covered with a gre
| lacework of algae so thick as to r
II sembIe one unbroken mass, but t
II water under this growth is fresh al
II pure.
II so long as a frog remains at nor
| he does not need to be fed at all, as
| forages for himself and gets all tn
I he can digest from insects and fro
| the spawn of his pond. The tadpo
seems to prefer a vegetable diet,
gets his chief dish from the algae.
is not generally known that frogs ha
teeth in the upper jaw, and that
| tadpole's horny beak is almost as sha
as the DILL of small birds.
when properly cared for, which,
far as / have been able to learn, CO
sists in keeping the frog in one po1
a frog produces from 5000 to 5000 eg
a season OF this number about thr'
fourths can be counted on to reach n
| turity.
The eggs first appear on the surfe