SILVEE FOX FARMING. 5 



pair. Pairs that had had large Utters were valued at about twice as 

 much as 6-months-old cubs. 



The maintenance of this prodigious inflation of prices was due 

 mainly to stock companies, which originally were formed by individ- 

 uals without sufficient capital to engage in fox farming alone. Almost 

 immediately, however, companies were formed for the benefit of those 

 having foxes to sell. It was customary for a company to take them 

 over. An attractive prospectus containing pictures of silver foxes, 

 an account of the 1910 sale of pelts, and a list of companies which had 

 paid dividends of 20 to 500 per cent was published, and the stock sold 

 through brokers and solicitors. Foxes that would bring $12,000 or 

 $15,000 a pair in the open market were usually capitalized in compa- 

 nies at $18,000 or $20,000, which, after allowing for commissions, 

 installation of pens, and other ranch necessities, left a tolerably safe 

 balance from which to pay the first year's running expenses. Another 

 reason for the multiplication of fox companies is found in the income 

 to be derived from them by brokers and promoters, and many com- 

 panies were formed by men having no other interest. The outbreak 

 of the European war, in the summer of 1914, interrupted and probably 

 ended these speculative operations. Ranch-bred silver foxes have 

 recently been advertised for sale at from $1,500 to $2,000 a pair. In 

 some of the western Provinces and Territories of Canada, where only 

 those foxes born or kept for a year or more in captivity are allowed 

 to be exported, prices of wild half -grown 'silvers run from $150 to $250 

 each. Prior to the war a general stagnation in the fur trade was 

 beginning to have a depressing influence on prices of live foxes. The 

 June, 1914, sale of silver fox skins in London averaged only about $118 

 each. From present indications values of foxes and of pelts are likely 

 soon to fall as low as they were before 1910. 



In the pioneer days, when proper methods of handling foxes were 

 unknown, many failures resulted from ignorance and carelessness. 

 The excitement following the fur sales of 1910 hastened the improve- 

 ment of methods of feeding, handling, and breeding. It also broke 

 the monopoly, and caused a rapid distribution of foxes and of infor- 

 mation concerning them. Now, with a comparatively large number 

 of silver foxes in domestication, with a clearer understanding of their 

 successful management, and with a return of moderate prices for 

 breeders, a steady, healthy, and general development of silver fox 

 farming may be expected. 



Fox ranches are established in most of the Canadian Provinces and 

 in Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, 

 Ohio, Wisconsin, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Oregon, Washing- 

 ton, and Alaska. In L913 there were 277 fox ranches on Prince Ed- 

 ward [sland alone. There; foxes have the same status as other do- 

 mestic animals in being subject to taxation; this in 1913 yielded 

 the Province a revenue of $37,172. In a recent report writ (en from 



