FARMING MUSKRAT FOR FUR 93 



curious old mother muskrat, following us not a paddle length from 

 the canoe up in the Cumberland Lake region, go on with much 

 the same antics to divert us from her burrow as a mother duck 

 will when she "plays" broken wing till her bobbling babies can 

 scuttle and dive. 



The burrows are either along the banks of streams slightly 

 above water level but entered under water, or in built-up nests in 

 shallow water, the living quarters above the water line, the entrance 

 below. Again and again, as we canoed through the muskrat 

 lagoons of the Eastern Saskatchewan, a little whiskered head about 

 the size of a large kitten would come up alongside our canoe with 

 beady curious eye and a skinny tail, with the wiggle of a fish and the 

 directing force of a rudder. I never could guess whether they 

 came so close because they did not know the fear of human, or from 

 sheer curiosity. 



In raw state, the muskrat fur resembles raw beaver, but the 

 muskrat is hardly a fourth the size of a beaver, and is always squarish 

 shaped where the beaver is long. Northern skins are lightest in 

 color, but thickest in fur. The darkest skins come from New 

 Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, but it has been suggested this is 

 because the Northern skins are taken in summer, when they are not 

 prime, and the Southern skins in winter, when at their best. If 

 this be so, there is a job for the game warden of the North ; for this 

 probably also explains why the long hairs of muskrat shed. Musk- 

 rat fur is both durable and cheap. Until the perfections in dyes, 

 it was used for hatting and for linings. When beavered hats went 

 out the call for muskrat fell off and the pelts fell to 10^. Then came 

 the dyes making it into an imitation seal ; and values jumped up 

 to $5 and #7. Will they stay at #5 and #7 ? Quien sabe ? If you 

 could answer that, you could make a fortune on a shoestring ; 

 but the most of traders who have attempted a fortune in muskrats 

 on a shoestring in the last year have accumulated a good sized 

 bankruptcy ; for they were men who did not know skins, and paid 

 as high for poor as good ; and the trade refused to take such skins 



