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+--- Thread: What to do with mongoose? (/showthread.php?tid=7159)
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What to do with mongoose? - Fishboy - 04-10-2010
I didn't want to hijack the discussion on chickens and mongoose, and I'd like to talk about a slightly different angle to this topic.
The abundance of such an animal and the state sanction on their eradication makes me wonder if there's a commercial use that could spark an interest in trapping. There's a fair market for exotic hides and furs among the natives of Alaska and Canada as parka lining, boots, mittens, and hats. I've never held one, so can't speak to the quality of the fur. Can anyone, preferably someone with an appreciation for fur, tell us if mongoose fur is at all supple and not coarse?
Aloha pumehana,
Brian and Mary
Lynnwood, WA\Discovery Harbour
RE: What to do with mongoose? - james weatherford - 04-10-2010
Your question has occurred to us.
The fur on the several we've recycled (under fruit trees) was soft, with short, fine hair.
As a lad, I hunted, skinned and ate rabbit and squirrel. The mongoose skin would appear to be closer to a squirrel than a rabbit. I've never attempted to remove the pelt from a mongoose. Only buried them.
In a highly recommended little book, among many interesting aspects is a tale regarding a major strike where upon the plantation workers were put out of their plantation houses. Where the strikers were living along the river in old Honolulu (near China town), mongoose recipes were a regular.
Takaki, Ronald (1983), Pau Hana: Plantation Life and Labor in Hawaii, 1835 - 1920, Honolulu, HI: University of Hawaii Press. .
James Weatherford, Ph.D.
15-1888 Hialoa
Hawaiian Paradise Park
RE: What to do with mongoose? - MarkP - 04-10-2010
I have shot them with a pellet gun. They are really tough little buggers. They are adapted to the tropics and have very little fur. They have no woolly undercoat. You can see right through to the skin. Being adapted to the tropics I doubt the fur would be much use in the cold.
Much is said about sustainable gardening on this website. Natural forms of fertilizer are a big deal. I am guessing that any animal, properly composted, would return some nutrients to the soil. If you look at it that way many things could have value. Most living organisms concentrate the required chemical building blocks of life in their bodies as they grow, and they work very hard to do so. Let them do the work and then recycle them when they come on your property.
I know that's easier said than done. Given the damage they do I'm sure you would be better off not having mongooses, rats, japanese beetles, etc in the first place than trying to recoup your losses. Nevertheless the principle is pleasing to contemplate. Bees for example can travel far and wide (much beyond your property), produce honey, and old brood can be fed to chickens. Supposedly bears go after bees more for the brood than for the honey. If only there was a way to catch large quantities of coqui frogs they could be composted if nothing else even if it didn't suppress their population. Native Americans buried a fish under their corn plants. I assume that this is because the fish were seasonally available in quantities too large to use. Would a mongoose not be an adequate substitute?
RE: What to do with mongoose? - Fishboy - 04-11-2010
I didn't have any illusions that there'd be a commercial use for mongoose, but I had to ask. I saw in the paper yesterday that Florida has established a bounty on pythons. Has Hawaii ever considered a bounty on mongoose?
Aloha pumehana,
Brian and Mary
Lynnwood, WA\Discovery Harbour
RE: What to do with mongoose? - Royall - 04-12-2010
I think if there was a bounty placed on the mongoose, you'd find the lazier people just keep and breed them like a "cash crop", rather than trying to trap them. Just my thoughts.
Royall
RE: What to do with mongoose? - Fishboy - 04-12-2010
Huh, yeah, you're probably right, Royall. Ah well, I'll just create a depression in the mongoose population around my house.
Aloha pumehana,
Brian and Mary
Lynnwood, WA\Discovery Harbour
RE: What to do with mongoose? - StillHope - 04-13-2010
Huli-huli mongo?
___________________________
Whatever you assume,please
just ask a question first.
RE: What to do with mongoose? - Fishboy - 04-13-2010
[
]Not a bad idea, Hope. Depending on whether they're scrauny or not, might make a nice stew.[]Aloha pumehana,
Brian and Mary
Lynnwood, WA\Discovery Harbour
RE: What to do with mongoose? - Carey - 04-14-2010
There is a European fashion house with a 'posh' coat trimmed with mongoose:
http://www.carolinakmit.com/en/furcoat_lines/posh_furcoat_line_female/rec_308
A Brazilian exporter that deals in mongoose fur:
http://br.tradeholding.com/default.cgi/action/viewcompanies/sellers-exporters-manufacturers/mongoose+fur/
And mongoose hair brushes were in vogue, but mostly are now synthetic... time to reintroduce NATURAL mongoose hair brushes!
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=brush+mongoose&x=0&y=0
RE: What to do with mongoose? - Hotzcatz - 04-28-2010
I skinned one once and there wasn't hardly enough there to make a hatband. It wasn't particularly nice fur, either. Sort of thin and scraggly. I had been hoping for mink, it wasn't anything close.
Maybe some mongoose taxidermy and dress them up in cute fashions and sell them to tourists? Of course, we'd need some tourists who wouldn't mind going over their baggage limit with oddball things.
Kurt Wilson