66 ECONOMIC MAMMALOGY 



Australian opossum; 325,000 squirrels; 23,500 kangaroo and wallaby. 

 One London firm alone in 1912 sold 9,435,125 pelts, 29 and at one sale 

 in that city 30,000 monkey skins changed hands. 30 A press dispatch 

 from St. Louis, dated May 3, 1919, said that on that day 90,000 wolf 

 skins were sold at auction for $904,450. At one New York auction 

 4,000,000 pelts were sold (600,000 muskrat and 280,000 mole be- 

 ing the largest single items), and at a St. Louis auction a total of 

 nearly 4,000,000 were sold, including the following: 31 Muskrat, 

 900,000; Russian squirrel, 810,000; marmot, 173,000; ermine, 

 118,000; mole, 750,000; mink, 279,000; nutria, 135,000; oppossum, 

 300,000; skunk, 215,000; raccoon, 130,000; and "thousands of oth- 

 ers." 



The value of annual catch of furs in the United States twenty- 

 five or thirty years ago was estimated at $25,000,000 and in 1925 at 

 $70,000,000, 32 the increase being largely due to advancing prices rather 

 than to increased numbers. The latter figure would pay interest at 

 5 per cent on a capitalization of $1,400,000,000. Therefore the fur- 

 bearers at present values should be worth to the country more than 

 one billion dollars an asset well worthy of careful conservation and 

 wise administration. 



Early in 1928 it was said that the fur catch of the United States 

 is worth to the trapper $60,000,000 each year; about $26,000,000 

 worth of furs imported and $100,000,000 worth exported annually, 

 $121,000,000 worth used annually in the States (retail value of furs 

 and trimmings annually used in the United States $500,000,000) ; 

 20,000 concerns in the United States handling furs; 2000 wholesale 

 manufacturers of furs in New York, with 8000 workers; 160 fur- 

 dressing and fur-dyeing concerns, with 5500 workers, annual pay roll 

 $8,400,000, dressing and dyeing 40,000,000 skins annually, exclusive 

 of rabbits; 100,000,000 rabbit skins imported annually, 40 per cent 

 for manufacture of fur garments, 50 per cent for manufacture of felt 

 hats. 33 The United States in one month imported furs and skins from 

 37 countries, and during the first three months of 1926 imported furs 

 from 55 countries; total imports of raw and dressed furs for 1924 

 were valued at $87,000,000 and for 1925 at $115,000,000, being ex- 

 ceeded by importations of only cane sugar, raw silk, coffee, crude rub- 



28 Hornaday, Our vanishing wild life, pp. 193-194, 1913. 



30 Lucas, Ann. Kept. U. S. Natl. Museum for 1889, p. 611. 



31 The Oologist, xxxvi, 27-29, 1919. 



32 Ashbrook and Earnshaw, Farmers' Bull., No. 1469, p. i, 1925. Taylor, Fur- 

 bearing mammals: An unappreciated natural resource, Science, xxxvii, 485-487, 1913. 

 88 Ashbrook, Fur j arming for profit, p. 4, 1928. 



