110 
FOREST AND STREAM 
March, 1921 
FUR FARMING FOR PERSIAN LAMB 
THE POSSIBILITIES IN THE RAISING OF FUR SHEEP IN THIS COUNTRY HAVE 
BEEN WELL DEMONSTRATED BY THE WORK OF DR. YOUNG IN TEXAS 
I T is said there are 5,000 species of 
mammals, of which 23 have been 
domesticated and 60 are fur oearers. 
Broadtail, Persian lamb, Astrakhan 
and Krimmer represent the dividing- 
line and meeting place between these 
two. They are both domesticated and 
fur-bearers. Perhaps our children’s 
children will live to see the day when 
all the fur-bearers are domesticated. 
Perhaps that is what the prophet 
meant when he foretold the lion lying 
down with the lamb. Certainly, the cat 
suckling the fox kittens may be a proto- 
type of what is coming. 
To clear the decks of common mis- 
conceptions: first — Persian lamb isn’t 
Persian lamb at all. It comes from 
Bokhara, Turkestan, Central Asia; but 
as it first came to European markets 
by Persian caravans, it took the name 
* Persian lamb. 
Second, the curliest and glossiest Per- 
sian lamb is not obtained by killing the 
mother to get the ’unborn kid. The kid 
to preserve the gloss and curl must be 
killed within a few days of birth, soon 
enough to avoid the reddish tinge that 
comes to the fur and can be seen by 
holding it up between the eye and the 
light. 
Sheroz is half-Persian lamb. It 
comes from the South of Persia and 
resembles wool more than fur. 
Next, Astrakhan is not dog skin. It 
is a lamb skin from the South of 
Russia. 
Gray Persian lamb is really Krim- 
mer, lamb from the Crimean region of 
Russia. 
The farming of these furs in their 
native habitat does not greatly con- 
cern the trade in America, except as 
we can transfer the farming here. 
The lamb that makes Persian fur, 
grown to a sheep makes the Bokhara 
rug. Arab sheiks are to this trade 
what chief factors used to be to the 
American fur trade. They are the mid- 
dlemen between the trade and the pro- 
ducer. Chieftains yearly bring 40,000 
to 50,000 skins each to the Far Eastern 
markets. Sometimes the herds are 
driven to market alive, the lambs 
killed, the flesh sold as meat, the hides 
as fur. At other times, the hides are 
brought in long slow-moving caravans 
and sold as dressed fur. The tightest 
curl and glossiest black bring the best 
prices for fur; and for fine fur only 
the saddle of the back is used. Gray 
skins are sold also; but gray are also 
sold dyed black. As in every other fur, 
the care and the nourishment of the 
mother before bringing forth her 
young, determine its fine quality. 
By caravans, it takes about the same 
time to bring the skins from Bokhara 
to the Russian markets, as to bring the 
skins from Alaska or Mackenzie River 
to St. Louis — 60 to 70 days. The pelts 
BY AGNES LAUT 
are brought out sewed face to face in 
pairs done up in bales of 160 pairs; and 
in one caravan will be 400 bales, worth 
all the way from $100,000 up. 
The skin is first cleaned in running 
water, then cured in tanks of salt, bar- 
ley flour and water, then scraped with 
a dull knife from all flesh and hung to 
dry 12 hours in the sun. They are 
washed again in running water and 
sprinkled with barley flour. They are 
then sorted and stamped back against 
back, and done up in bales for the 
shipment to market. 
Tight-curled Karakul lamb on Dr. 
Young’s ranch. 
D R. YOUNG, of Texas, the first 
American to rear Persian lamb 
successfully in America, says 
there are six distinct classes of these 
fur-bearing sheep. It was in 1908, he 
imported fifteen head to America. It 
was only when he crossed Karakul Afg- 
han with an Arabi strain that he pro- 
duced a skin bringing a price of $6.50 
a pelt. In 1912, Dr. Young imported 
some true Bokharas. Fur farmers who 
buy the first strain will not realize a 
good fur price. Those who buy de- 
scendants of the second importation 
will; and American traders tell me de- 
scendants of the second importation are 
now coming on the market. From Dr. 
Young’s original stock at Belen, Tex- 
as, have spread flocks to Texas, New 
Mexico, Kansas, Maryland and Prince 
Edward Island. One of the tests of the 
fur-producing strains from the wool 
strain is the absence of soft under 
wool in the pelage. In any case, the 
flock of the Karakul is always as good 
a seller as our domestic sheep; and if 
the herd does not grade up as fur, it 
may as wool. The qualities that dis- 
tinguish fur from wool are — tight 
curl, smallness and crispness of the 
wave, lustre and silkiness of the skin. 
All Persian lambs to-day are improved 
by a brush lustre of dye. In fact, 
good Persian lamb like good seal is one 
of the dyed skins that goes in first 
rank. 
Lambs to be used for fur should be 
killed within 5 days of birth. After 
5 days, the curl coarsens and commands 
the price of a common fur; and after 
six weeks, the skin may be described 
as wool. Slinks, or still-born lambs, 
are the finest fur of all. Baby lamb, 
or Broadtail, is the name usually ap- 
plied to these still-born or very young- 
lambs. Before the War, $12 was cheap 
for such a pelt. Since the War, prices 
have increased 140 per cent. Natives 
of Bokhara are as jealous of selling 
any of their sheep as trappers in the 
Canadian North are of their fur sec- 
rets. Sheep on the ranch cost $60 
and must then, be brought out at great 
risk thousands of miles. If the sheep 
brought out by Dr. Young of Texas 
finally multiply into trade proportions, 
it will spell the end of the exclusive 
Persian Iamb trade for Bokhara of 1,- 
500,000 pelts yearly; and just before 
the War the Emir of the district had 
issued an edict prohibiting the expor- 
tation of Bokharas. 
Poor Persian lamb skins do not bring 
25c each. Good skins run from $3.50 
to $20. The average of 7,229 skins re- 
cently sold in Montreal was $8.40. 
The durability of Persian lamb de- 
pends primarily on the first dressing, 
second on the dyeing; and the princi- 
pal object is to avoid cracking. Too 
thin skin can be reinforced but cracked 
skin will rip. The test as told else- 
where is to stretch slightly. If there is 
a sound of an impending rip, beware 
the skin. 
Pure bred stock to-day is selling at 
from $500 to $1,000; and with those 
prices ruling, while the same financial 
success may not reward the Persian 
lamb farmers as has rewarded the sil- 
ver fox farmers, who get 9 puppies 
increase from a pair a year, still the 
Persian lamb is not a monogamous gen- 
tleman. He has up to 20 wives, and 20 
lambs a year from one $500 sire with 
hides at $8 to $15, and flesh at 30 to 
40 cents a pound, with the cheap range 
of feeding ground on which sheep sub- 
sist — mean a profit that may easily 
place Persian lamb farming second to 
silver fox, and such mink and sable 
and marten farms as are still in an ex- 
perimental stage. 
T WO official reports have come out 
on Karakul sheep farming in the 
United States and Canada; one 
by the Animal Bureau of the Agricul- 
tural Department, Washington, the 
other by Dr. Young, himself, whose 
success has exceeded his expectations. 
Says the U. S. Year Book of 1915: 
“Since 1909, fifty-four of these sheep 
have been brought to the United 
