Raising
Rachillas—
a 4-H Club Experiment
In the 1940’s, at 10 and 12 years old, my
brother and I belonged to the 4-H club. It is sort of the
stepping-stone, stepchild and kid-brother to the Future Farmers of
America (FFA).
It seems that back in the day, 4-H Club
programs brought together public and private agricultural resources for
the purpose of helping rural youth connect with the real world of
Agri-business. At that time established farmers did not readily accept
the new research and discoveries being promoted by the elite Ag
colleges.
However, educators found that the youth would “experiment” with these
new ideas and then share their experiences and successes with the
adults. So the implementation of rural youth programs became a way to
introduce new agriculture technology to the adults.
History has it, that one such youth program began in Ohio in 1902. It is
considered to be the birth of the 4-H program in the U.S. When Congress
created the Cooperative Extension Service at the US Department of
Agriculture (USDA) in 1914, it included boys' and girls' [Ag] club work.
This soon became known as the 4-H clubs — Head, Heart, Hands, and
Health. So it is, that, life skills of rural youth were promoted
mostly through experiential Agricultural learning programs.
The symbol of the 4-H club is the four-leaf
clover, imprinted with an “H” on each green leaf. When a youngster
joined the 4-H Club, annually, as an achievement award, they were given
an enamel lapel pin crafted in the shape of a four-leaf clover. The
first year had one “H” imprinted on one green clover leaf. The second
year, a second “H”, until all four green leaves had an “H” imprinted in
the enamel pin. The four-year pin was a pin to coveted —a big deal to us
rural kids. I forget what the achievement award we received after four
years. Maybe we joined or were adopted by the FFA.
Anyways, since we poor, we were always
looking for a means of income—a way to make enough money to go to a good
Ag College. Being motivated by the “Head and Hands” part of the
motto, we were often trying to think up a new experiment that might lead
to making a few bucks. We always had some sort of “4-H” farm project
that the “farm advisor” would periodically review and evaluate. Fresh
out of college, Dan Close was the “farm advisor” for all of San Diego
County so, we only saw him about twice a year. He would spend a little
time with us and always had some good advice and commendation.
At the time, we had been raising rabbits for
food and profit and selling their pelts. We had about two-dozen rabbits
cooped up in hutches. Being fast breeders their numbers developed
rapidly. But, as it turned out, the going price of rabbit meat dropped
so low that we were losing money. Rabbit feed was high. However, the
price of rabbit pelts remained pretty high.
Slaughtered rabbits are dressed out for meat
by first skinning them. Hung up by their hind legs, their skin is pulled
down over their body and on to a wire hide (pelt) stretcher, inside out,
like pulling off a boot sock. Then lightly salted, the pelts are hung up
in the shade to cure. A good rabbit pelt brought about a buck to one
fifty. That was significantly more than we could get for the prime
rabbit meat.
We began thinking that, if we could raise
rabbits and get a few measly bucks for their for pelts, why not raise an
animal that produced a higher priced pelt? Expensive, mink was
immediately out of the question since they are a northern species and
could not be raised for fur Southern California.
So, we thought of raising chinchillas, but
the cost of getting started with a breeding pair was more than we could
afford. Chinchillas produce a very, dense, silky fur that, during our
time, was in high demand. One thing we learned is that chinchillas are
in the rat family. They grow wild in South America, in rocky
mountainside habitat. —Now that started us thinking.
Here we are living in rocky mountainside
habitat where a similar furry species thrives amidst piles of huge
boulders. In those rocky areas we knew of a particular large rat known
as a wood rat, also commonly called a pack rat. In the winter they get
very fat and furry.
So, we got this idea… how about capturing
and raising these furry wood rats? The idea was that eventually we might
just be able to barter with a farmer for a low-priced chinchilla that
was being culled from his breeding stock. Then, maybe we could do a 4-H
club experiment by cross-breeding and come up with a hardy Southern
California breed. We already had in mind that the new breed would be
called a “Rachilla!” Now to us, this was getting interesting. It had our
imagination running wild.
First things first, though— first, we had to
capture the elusive furry wood rats that lived in rock piles and rocky
crevices. This called for some imagination of the creative sort. We had
to learn their habits, food source and food preferences. Do they feed on
grains, seed, fruits, grasses and certain wild plants? Before we
attempted to trap them, we experimented with a pre-feeding test program—
this was part of our 4-H experiment. We kept good records for the farm
advisor.
They definitely liked the commercial rabbit
pellets we had on hand. I don’t quite know how we learned it, but they
were attracted to dehydrated orange rinds…old dried out orange rinds. So
we had our bait system pretty well figured out. Both baits had a nice
odor as a natural attractant. This is very important to baiting a trap
for a wild creature.
Wood
rats are pale buff, gray or reddish brown, usually with white undersides
and feet. We thought the variation would make for some very attractive
pelts. They have fairly large ears and normally, hairy tails. They can
range in length from 8 to 20 inches, including their tail. So they get
to be good size—almost as big as a chinchilla.
According to the literature, typically,
wood rats have up to 5 litters per year with as many as 5 young per
litter. So, it doesn’t take much to figure out the numbers and the
business potential!
But first we had to catch a few of them. We
came up with an ingenious idea for a live-trap to catch them unharmed.
We built this wire mesh cage-trap about 8 inches square and about two
feet long. The entrance was designed with a slanted wood ramp. It
operated on a crossbar like the balance of a teeter-totter. The
entrance board was weighted on the outside end with lead B-B’s so as the
rat walked up the board slope his weight would tip him down into the
trap. The weighted, balance board, ramp would then automatically tip
back up and close the entrance, so the live rat couldn’t get out. This
allowed us to catch more than one live rat at time. It worked perfect!
To attract them to the entrance, we put a
small bait container at the top of the ramp, inside the trap. As they
walked up the ramp to sniff out the bait, the teeter-totter dipped down
and they went under the enclosed bait in to the trap.
It wasn’t long ‘till we had a dozen rats
caged in a few rabbit hutches. In each cage we placed a nest box with
entry holes. The rats are nocturnal so they hid in the boxes during the
day. We seldom saw them out in the open.
About now Dad is wondering what we are up
to. Once he learned of our 4-H club experiment, he had a kaniption-fit!
We did our best to explain our great idea of raising “Rachillas.” He
wasn’t impressed. He lectured us on the fact they are carriers of fleas
that cause bubonic plague… black death. It’s true, and fleas were always
a problem in this semi-arid backcountry. He also told us that they are
carriers of the deadly rabies virus. So if we got bit, there was a good
chance that we could get infected and die.
He tried to tell us that pack rats would
never crossbreed with chinchillas anyway. Now, how could he, or anyone
else be so sure without experimenting? Guess what? We were forced by the
facts and common sense (known as, “don’t cross Dad”), to abandon our
experiment and get rid of our potential moneymaking wood rats. So we
never knew if we could have actually developed a new breed—a “Rachilla”!
However, not to be deterred, we began
thinking in a new direction. Our idea was based on an old country yarn
that we had heard throughout our life. It’s one of those fascinating
country tales you hear told around the campfire, or kitchen table, that
you never forget. In fact it planted the seeds of 4-H club
entrepreneurship in us.
As it was, there were some eccentric folks
that had moved here in the backcountry… kind of a different sort.
Strangely, they were raising a special breed of Himalayan cats. Now that
was sure different in these parts. Nobody raised a dang cat. To us cats
just happened to exist around the barn to control mice and rats. But,
these particular cats had the finest thick fur of any fur-bearing animal
we ever saw. So we thought, what about raising Himalayan cats for their
pelts?
Based on the idea of the folk story, we had
in mind to start rather small. We would begin by breeding about a
hundred thousand cats. Each cat averages about twelve kittens per year.
This would give us, one point two million cat skins per year to sell.
The skins could be sold for about $2.00 for the plain ones and up to
$4.00 for the multicolored ones. A rare calico would bring a premium. At
an average price of around $3.00 per skin, our revenues should be about
$3, 600,000.00 dollars each year. Think of it! This averages out to
about $12,000.00 a day---excluding Sundays and holidays!
Since we were near the border, we had it
figured that a skilled Mexican cat-skinner would skin about 50 cats per
day. Paying minimum wage, it would take 663 skilled laborers to operate
the cat farm so that the net profit would be over $8,600.00 per day!
What a successful 4-H project that would be!
Now the cats would be fed white rats
exclusively. White rats multiply four times faster than cats and they
are not as subject to dangerous fleas and rabies. We would start a white
rat operation adjacent to the cat farm. We figured if we started with
four hundred thousand rats, we would have four rats per cat per day. The
rats would be fed the carcasses of the cats that we skinned. This would
give each rat a quarter of a cat carcass of a high protein, sort of like
cat jerky. You can see by this, that, our business would be a very clean
operation, self supporting and really, nearly automatic throughout. The
concept was, the cats would eat the rats and the rats will eat the cats
and we would get the skins!!
Eventually it was our hope to cross the cats
with snakes, then, they would skin themselves twice a year! We certainly
had plenty of snakes out here in this mountainous backcountry. This
would save the labor of skinning as well as give us two skins for one
cat! In no time, we would have the money to go to a good Ag College,
with plenty of money in our pockets! What an achievement that would be!
Well, to some, this country tale about
crossing cats with snakes might sound like a spoof on the 4-H club, but
think about it carefully, the potential is there. After all, it’s the
4-H club that taught us to use our imagination and experiment with an
Ag-project. So, who cares where the idea came from, even if was that
tall tale that fired our or imagination.
So, mentioned, when a youngster joined the
4-H club, at the end of one year, they were given an enamel pin as an
achievement award. It was crafted with the shape of a four-leaf clover.
To have the pin with four “H’s” on it— now that was something to be
coveted —a big deal to us rural kids.
True, we never did get our Rachilla farm
started, but we ate lot of fried rabbit and learned a lot about wood
rats and the fur market. Interesting, “Head, Heart Hands and Health”
— at that age, isn’t most of life an experiment?
So, in my reminiscing, I searched around and
found my sixty-five year old pins. Yes, I still have my old 4-H club
lapel pins, but I must have lost the coveted four-year pin. I have one,
two and three “H’s”, but not four.
Does it change anything? No, because the
idea of raising “Rachillas” was only a child’s 4-H club experiment. As
Albert Einstein once said: “Imagination is more important than
knowledge.” So, who knows? Maybe the modern 4-H’ers will experiment in a
lab by means of crossing and cloning— and certain pack rat DNA— and come
up with a furry “Rachilla!”
Ed Keenan © 09-09
