TURNED-DOWN CUBS. 75 



escape, and usually commence playing about ; 

 in fact, I have seen them come out and start 

 playing immediately they were put down, and it 

 was only when tired with their gambols that 

 they seemed to recognise their strange sur- 

 roundings. The fifty yards of wire-netting allow 

 a nice space for play ; this, of course, could be 

 restricted if the number of cubs turned-down is 

 small. 



The wire-fencing should be kept up for two 

 or three days only, until the cubs become 

 settled down and accustomed to the earth, and 

 then quietly removed in the evening, placing 

 the food near the holes as usual. 



The cubs very quickly find out the neighbour- 

 ing earths, into which -they almost invariably 

 shift, thus having the advantage of a nice fresh 

 earth to live in, returning at night for their food 

 to the old earth, where it should be put down 

 regularly every evening. 



It is a great mistake to keep cubs shut in too 

 long, as the earth soon becomes very foul, and 

 they run the risk of contracting mange, by 

 being forced to live in an unclean earth, from 

 which the vixen would soon have shifted them 

 in their wild state. 



