Evening Republican, Volume 14, Number 174, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 July 1910 — FROGS FOR PROFIT [ARTICLE]

FROGS FOR PROFIT

Marine Hospital Offers Market for Large Number of Croakers. Fish Commissioner Meehan Enthusiastic Over Industry Gives Explicit Directions for Success in This Venture—Requires Much Care. Lansdowne, Pa.—Frog farming has been carried on to some extent on many Pennsylvania estates in a small way for several years, past. In some' instances the presence of an inherited frog pond of goodly dimensions, where the croakers have heralded each spring for numberless years (and increased in numbers in their congenial quarters in marshy or swampy farm ponds), it has not been difficult to establish a profitable industry by simply catching quantities of the old frogs each year and allowing the others to increase. In other instances the industry is followed as a fashionable fad, and owners of country seats have historic ponds and streams devoted to frog raising under the care of an expert, or new ponds are provided with this object in view. The principal hotels 61 our large cities have for some years past demanded a sufficient quantity of frogs to provide their guests with frequent treats to the toothsome frog-leg suppers and to keep up a sufficient demand to make the industry profitable. Now there Is a new incentive to frog-raising. Old Br’er Bullfrog, sonorous musician of our ponds, is found to be of special use for government experiments and he will now be in greater demand than ever. The marine hospital is planning to spend considerable money this fiscal year for frogs for use in testing ’medicinal preparations at the hygienic laboratory of the institution. There are many things to consider in establishing profitable frog ponds. Fish Commissioner Meehan is enthusiastic over the industry and he has given explicit directions for success in this venture. He says those who decide to undertake frog farming may make up their minds beforehand, that the days which will follow will not be free from care or anxiety. It will be speedily discovered that

it Is not sufficient to build ponds after supposed best types, stock them and then stand aside and wait for the tadpoles to change to frogs and the frogs to money or into delicious morsels of food. Enough has been learned of frog culture, however, to stimulate a country gentleman or a progressive farmer with an unutilized portion of swampy land to undertake It Fifty dollars will build the initial ponds and Inclose them with a suitable fence. There Is always a strong probability that within a comparatively brief period, by the exercise of care, unceasing effort, and experiment; the work will develop into a fair market industry.