FROG LEG HUNTERS

Evening Post, Volume CXIII, Issue 125, 31 May 1927, Page 17

FROG LEG HUNTERS

LUCRATIVE CALLING

DEMAND IN AMERICA

An old French Canadian guide, voicing his enthusiasm over a certain delicacy ol diet, had this to say: "Now, you tak nice, fat bullfrog, an' cut off hees hin' lag. Skin heeru, soak heem in 6alt water, an' parboil heem. Den you roll' heem in corn meal—or mebbe you lak de fine cracker crumb. After dat you fry heem brown in buttaire, an'—an'-*I jes 'zactly soon have chicken I"

While there are m«ny American people who have yet to taste their first frogs' legs, the business of taking frogs for market has greatly increased in recent years states the "New York Times." The chief consumption is in the hotels and restaurants of the large cities, specifically, accqrding to the United ..States .Bureau of Fisheries, New York, Boston, St. Louis, Chicago, Philadelphia, Baltimore, San Irancisco, Washington, and New Orleans. There are other sizable cities like Detroit, Cincinnati and Minneapolis whose names do hot seem to appear in the official list of frog-consuming communities. As yet the market depends on the natural supply of frogs. Intensive frog farming does not seem to have such progress as fur farming. Yet taking frogs for market is an industry carried on in all sections of the United States and of economic importance in about fifteen States. In nearly all the remaining States and Territories frogs are taken lor local consumption in considerable quantities, but no statistical records.a«i available. bureau of Fisheries figures place the annual catch in the United States at about 1,000,000 pounds, with a gross value to the hunters of 50,000 dollars. Consumers, it jg estimated, eat 150,000 dollars' worth of frogs' legs annually. Prices received for frogs legs vary greatly depending upon the condition of the market, the size o£ the frogs, and the locality. Dressed legs yield the hunters from 12H to 50 cents a pound and live frogs from 5 cents to 4 dollars a dozen.

In 1908 the whole' of the United States reported 250,000 pounds of frogs' legs, valued at 42,000 dollars, the thirteen States which furnished this total not including New York. In 1915-18, however, in the Oneida Lake region, one firm alone conducted a gross business of about 15,000 dollars a year in frogs' legs. 'A single customed, between lit June, 1915, and Ist March, 1916, bought 1687 dollars worth. When sold by the hundred, live weight, large and small, the,price ranges from 30 cents to 1.50 dollars—an average of 1.05 dollars. The legs sell by the pound, large and small, from 10 to 60 cents, or an average of 35 cents a pound. An expert can dress between 1500 and 1800 frogs an hour, but an average rate is nearer 1000 hourly. The wholesale price on cold storage frogs is about 4 dollars a dosen for what are known as "jumbos" and 2 dollars a dozen for "mediums."