Ferrets - Living rat traps

In this article from Popular Science, February 1936, about how Levi Farsworth started raising ferrets and became one of the largest ferret farms in New London, Ohio, raising as many as 10,000 a year. They were sold for extermination of rats, but they also were used for ridding of other pests. It explains how the ferrets are raised and kept.

Living Rat Traps RAISED ON NOVEL FARMS

In This Article, the Author Takes You for a Visit To a Strange “Ranch” Where Ferrets Are Bred by Thousands To Aid Man in His War Against Rodents
By Walter E. Burton

IF A MAN. . . make a belter mouse-trap than his neighbor,” someone said, “though he build his home in the woods, the world will make a beaten path to his door.” The truth of this statement is being realized with profit by a number of “farmers” in the vicinity of New London, Ohio; only the traps are raised and not built, and they work equally well with rats, prairie dogs, and squirrels. New London is known as the ferret center of the world, because more of those animals are raised there than in any other place, some 25,000 a year being a conservative present-time estimate.

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