SLUMP IN LIONS

Evening Star, Issue 20634, 6 November 1930, Page 15

SLUMP IN LIONS

VALUE OF WILD BEASTS A recent sale of animals at the famous Hamburg wild animal marketeast a surprising light upon tho drop in ; prices of •many wild animals that once commanded very high figures. Lions, for example, are not worth more than £l5O each at tho outside, and many other creatures once commanding extravagant figures are now comparatively cheap. Mr B. G. Boulengor, director of the Zoological Society’s aquarium, in an article in the ‘ Daily Telegraph,’ explains that tho drop in prices is not duo to any loss of interest in animals, for zoos are more popular than ever, and' private menageries are on the increase. The present “slump” is largely duo to the strides that have recently been made in menagerie_ keeping, involving many discoveries in medicine and general hygiene. These have unquestionably done much to reduce the prices of many creatures, since a much lower mortality automatically decreases the demand for fresh specimens. As a result, for instance, of the use in all up-to-date menageries of artificial sunlight, many creatures, once rarities, can now be induced to breed freely. The hippopotamus, for example, once commanded almost any price the dealers liked to demand, but to-day so many happy marriages have enriched the world’s zoos with hippo calves that £4OO is the outside figure for an adult river horse. Giraffes are still valued at £I,OOO a pair, and a good riding elephant will fetch anything between £4OO and £6OO. Tho great apes are, of course, in a class by themselves. A good-tempered, welltrained chimpanzee is almost beyond valuing, and worth many times an unsophisticated specimen recently imported into this country. LOVE BIRDS AS BRIDAL GIFT. Birds, on the whole, are cheaper than mammals, though extravagant figures are sometimes set on certain fancy species. The extraordinary heights to which the price of blue budgerigars soared at one period may be traced to the great popularity of this variety of lovo bird in the Far East. It has ever been the custom in Japan for the wealthy bridegroom to present his bride with a pair of those little parrnkeets. A few years ago the price of these birds was forced upward till it reached £l6O a pair, at which point every European clcajor seriously addressed himself

to the possibilities of breeding thebhie variety on a large scale. So well did they succeed that the bubble burst with dramatic suddenness, leaving behind a swarm of bluo budgerigars that to-day are not worth more than £2 10s a pair. Beauty often counts far less than rarity in fixing an animal’s market value. Tho writer was asked some years ago to pay £2OO for a pair of “lion-hearted” goldfish. This triumph of the breeder’s art is a goldfish minus its dorsal fin, and with the head surmounted by fleshy growths which ai o remarkably suggestive ot disease. Sea fish of any kind cannot be regarded as cheap,-and few specimens m the Zoo aquarium cost the society less than £5. -This may seem a grotesque price for fish that would bo dear at lOd a lb in any shop, but it must be remembered that the sate transport of these animals from the sen to the Zoo is a much more difficult task than the conveyance of a monkey or lion from tho Congo to Kcgent’s Park. The specific gravity aeration, heating, etc., of tho travelling water needs constant attention, and oven the most tireless efforts may icault in the final entry into the aquarium of a mere corpse. Reptiles possibly find a smaller clientele than most other creatures. Ihe larger snakes are sold at about £1 a foot for the first 12ft. When this length is exceeded, however, the pnee depends chiefly upon the purse of the purchaser and the dealer s nerve.