FUR-FARMING IN CANADA 75 
They say that the chief difficulties are in securing the first litter 
from the wild animals and in getting suitable food. The wild mink 
is usually wholly unsusceptible to domestication or even semi-domes- 
tication. They frequently kill themselves by hanging, cutting their 
throats, or beating their heads against a wall. Most of them will 
commit suicide or die of fear on the near approach of a dog. These 
facts have been corroborated in the experience of 1912, a large pro- 
portion of wild foxes having died while being shipped and a large 
number of those caught for ranching purposes being found dead, some- 
times badly cut or lacerated. 
If the young are taken from the mother as early as possible—say 
six weeks or seven weeks old, in Eastern Canada about June 15— 
they become very tame and, according to the advocates of this new 
method of ranching, can be reared in family colonies afterwards. A 
colony house, or large box, can be provided and a considerable runway 
or paddock may extend in front to include a portion of a stream. 
The food is English sparrows, frogs, meat, fish, bread and milk. 
The young are fed new milk. An English sparrow each day is the 
proper amount of food. As they are promiscuous in mating, the 
majority of the males may be slaughtered and only the finest kept. 
The method of ranching mink which has been used almost 
exclusively in America is one which employs a small pen 
for each animal and supplies the water in troughs to each 
pen. The two largest establishments visited consisted of an ordinary 
barn about 20 feet wide and 30 feet long. The walls were open under 
the eaves to make the interior as airy as possible. On either side of 
a central alley were pens about 4 feet wide and 8 feet long, provided 
with a nest box on a slight elevation, and having a crooked passage 
for entrance. Water ran through troughs at the ends of the pen, or 
was pumped in daily. The partitions were of wire above and boards 
near the floor. If wire is used for the walls, an overhang is necessary 
to prevent climbing out, or the wire might be made to extend over 
the pens completely. Very little light is required, as the mink usually 
sleeps during the day. 
Mink can be reared in such pens, but there are grave doubts of the 
permanency of the good health of the animals. In a Nova Scotia ranch 
there was no difficulty in rearing an average of thee and a half 
to a litter. The young minks had litters of from two to four 
and the older breeders sometimes had six. With such satisfactory 
1esults, when every pair raised could be sold for $40 and food could be 
procured freely, it is inconceivable why development of the business 
did not proceed. The managers were continually selling off their stock 
The Single 
Pen System 
