72 COMMISSION OF CONSERVATION 
Quebec and the Ungava peninsula. While it lives on the water a large 
part of its time and makes its home near st1eams, it can live on the land 
away from the wate: and has even been found in trees. 
The fur is dense and soft and the overhair is of stiff lustrous water 
hairs. The darkest colour extends down the back and tail. The dyers 
usually accentuate the dark colour by brush dying or tipping the fur. 
Brass estimates the world’s yearly supply as follows: America 
600,000 skins; Europe, 20,000; and Asia, 20,000. They do not seem 
to be decreasing rapidly, but the price is advancing and, owing to the 
excellent quality and durability of the fur, is likely to remain high. 
Some fancy ranch skins have been sold for $13 and good skins will 
bring about $10 each. Some conception of the extra value of north- 
eastern mink can be formed when it is known that Quebec furiers sold 
their mink to New York in 1911 at $9 each, and purchased mink of 
the same quality mixed with best eastern United States skins at $8 each. 
MinkK-F ARMING 
The farming of the mink is still in the experimental stage and 
no ranches examined, except perhaps two, would justify detailed de- 
scriptions as models to copy from. It has been demonstrated that mink 
can be kept in captivity and its young reared successfully. As for the 
quality of pelt, only a few statements could be secured. All attempts 
to rear this animal in Canada are too recent, or else were made over 
thirty years ago when mink was high-priced, and accurate records were 
not kept. The statements of sales of skins received were highly satisfac- 
tory, and indicate that pelts from stock bred in ranches is, under cer- 
tain conditions, better than the wild stock. It was also demonstrated 
that rapid improvement in the stock is possible because of the oppor- 
tunity for selection of sires—an opportunity not possible in fox rear- 
ing at the present time because of the latter animal’s monogamous 
habits. Thus, one male out of every four or five can be chosen for 
his size, beauty of colour or quiet disposition, and a rapid improvement 
towards a good stock made. 
There have been hundreds of mink ranches in America and there 
are probably about fifty in Canada at the present time. None of them 
are very pretentious except, possibly, that of La Compagnie Zootechnique 
de Labelle, Ltd., the head office of which is in Montreal and the ranch 
at Lac Chaud, in the Laurentian highlands of Quebec. The capital of 
the company is $49,000. As soon as the success of mink-ranching is 
assured, it is proposed to proceed with the breeding of the otter along 
similar lines. 
