RABBIT SKIN MARKET.

Southern Cross, Volume 2, Issue 2, 14 April 1894, Page 12

RABBIT SKIN MARKET.

J. H. Kirk and Co., Don street, Invercargill, report as follows; — This past season has been a most disappointing and disastrous one for exporters, and we regret to hear by cable of a still further decline in London of -J-d per lb all round. We gather that the most unusual series of falls this commodity has suffered ever since August, when our autumn skins begin to arrive in London in quantity, is mainly attributed to the absence of demand from America, and we can only hope that with the final settlement of the tarilf question in that country, together with the return of the commercial confidence consequent .hereon, prices will again recover somewhat. Though America is responsible to some extent for this unsatisfactory state of things, overproduction has also helped to bring prices down, we should judge in all likelihood permanently. The demand for rabbit skins is not practically unlimited like that for wool, and when we find that the imports into London during the last five years have increased ■ from 5,000 to 10,000 bales (this scarcely looks like extermination by the way) it is not wonderful that this price has diclined in sympathy. Now that the poisoning season is approaching we would ask our friends to see that their skins are properly dried and fatted before sending to market, and also that in stretching they will put the wire down the back and belly, as this method preserves the fur from damaging when the skins are packed in bales. We are always buyers of any quantity both here and Dunedin at highest current prices, free of all charges. We shall also be pleased to supply address labels and bags, free of cost, on application.