38 COMMISSION OF CONSERVATION 
A perfect fox diet can be secured in the patent dog biscuits. 
yor ees These are made with various kinds of food content, so that 
balanced rations can be provided. The biscuit medicines 
have also been proved excellent, and are easy to administer. It is 
possible that the manufacture of biscuit with meat or fisn fibre will 
be an industry that will develop contemporaneously with fur-farming. 
The meat can probably be best preserved in this way and feeding made 
easier and pleasanter. 
Broken bone should not be fed lest some of it be 
General Directions = swallowed. Bone should be fed, especially to young 
for Feeding anes ee i y 
foxes, to assist in building up bone and in removing 
the milk teeth. Some do not feed bony fish, e.g., perch, lest the bones 
rupture the delicate linings of the throat and intestines. Observation, 
however, leads to the belief that such injury is not likely to happen, 
as they are dainty feeders and, unlike dogs, do not devour their food 
greedily. In addition to bones, growing foxes are fed a quantity of 
limewater—about one teaspoonful a day—with their milk. This food 
gives a substance to the bone and insures stronger limbs. The pregnant 
mother should also be fed bone broth and limy foods to insure strong 
limbs for her offspring. 
Neither of the foxes should be allowed to become too fat for 
breeding. When the foxes are less than a year old, they can be fed 
almost as much as they will eat; after they are older, a full diet may 
make them too fat for good breeding condition. An average size fox 
should weigh from eight to eleven pounds. Some feeders stint foxes 
in food in November and December and January, to get them into 
breeding condition; others endeavour to keep them normal always. 
In the mating season, foxes are very active, and fat pork is fed and 
a full supply of food is given to keep them in condition. Some roll 
the meat in sand and soil, claiming that soil is nature’s medicine for 
worms. Some feeders throw food into the pen over the fence; others, 
in order to tame them, try to coax them to receive it from between 
the meshes of the wire. A skilful feeder can do more to tame his foxes 
through feeding them than in any other way. If the food is always 
delivered at the same place, the tendency will be for the animal to 
approach nearer and nearer at each feeding. The science of foods is 
of less importance than a knowledge of the art of feeding. 
The mother should be well fed on an attractive and strengthening 
diet for several weeks before the young are born. Milk, eggs and bone 
broth are good for the purpose. When the young are expected, laxative 
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