How Do Mink Work?

Mink are amazing animals -- but in our culture, they're often better known as a fur product than a creature. Learn how humans have made a mess of mink in this episode of BrainStuff, based on this article: https://animals.howstuffworks.com/mammals/mink.htm

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of I Heart Radio.
Hey brain Stuff, Lauren bog Obam Here. It's possible you've
heard of a mink, and it's also possible that the
thing that pops into your head when you hear that
word is a fur coat. But of course, a natural
fur coat is made of animal skins. In the parlance

(00:23):
of our times, a mink is a coat, and astronomically
expensive one at that, made of the pelts of a
type of weasel, also called a mink, which is captured
or raised in captivity for the purpose of providing rich
people with cozy outerwear. But what makes mink for such
a desirable material for glamorous jackets, and why we've been

(00:45):
trapping and wearing minks since at least the eleventh century,
is also what helps a mink survive in the wild.
A two species of mink exists on the planet Earth today.
The third, the c mink, is now extinct due to
a couple of centuries of per secution by fur trappers.
Both surviving species have thick, soft water repellent fur, and

(01:06):
as did the extinct mink. Both the American mink and
the critically endangered European mink are semi aquatic, meaning they
stick close to waterways, streams, rivers, wetlands, lakes, etcetera, where
they can find all the foods they like to eat
best frogs, birds, clams, eggs, aquatic insects, and small animals

(01:26):
like rabbits and mice. They love slinking around rocky river
banks in the early morning and evening and during the
heat of the day, repairing to their luxurious, multi chambered
burrows lined with grass, fur, and feathers. They're extremely tricky
to trap because they're smart and suspicious. But we humans are,
if nothing else great devising ingenious ways of killing stuff,

(01:49):
so we've managed to put mink in a precarious position.
The American mink is doing pretty well in the wild.
They can be found in parts of every state in
the United States except air Zona, and aren't uncommon throughout
their natural range. In fact, they're also not uncommon in
other places in the world, including the traditional range of
the European mink, which is native to Europe and Eurasia.

(02:13):
American mink were brought to Europe in the early twentieth
century in order to satisfy the European passion for fur garments,
and by the nineteen fifties at least four hundred registered
mink for farms existed in the UK Loane, all stocked
with American mink, the species of choice for the fur industry,
since they're larger bodied than the European species and their

(02:33):
coats are a bit longer and denser. But it's perhaps
predictably difficult to hold a weasel captive. And the American
mink that had spent a few generations on European farms
escaped and became naturalized citizens of Europe, and it turns
out they were very aggressive towards the locals. A feral

(02:55):
farm raised mink and their offspring began killing European mink
and their kits before the article. This episode is based
on how Stuff Work. Spoke with Dr Innigo Zubero Gortia,
a researcher in the Department of Environmental Studies at ICARUS
in Laurino, Spain. He said it is important to consider
the feral American mink is not the same as native

(03:16):
American mink in North America. A feral American mink is
like a new species created by humans after decades of
breeding in captivity. They do not behave in the same
way as wild American mink in their native range. An
example of altered behavior in feral American mink in Europe
has to do with territory. Wild male animals of both

(03:38):
species are normally very territorial and don't put up with
other males sharing their area. Feral American mink, on the
other hand, don't seem to mind sharing space with each other.
Zabarro Gortia said. In this way, in rivers where it
was once possible to find one European mink male in
between three and four females, you can now find as

(03:59):
many thirty American mink. The predation pressure in the area
is extremely strong. As a result of this ecological debacle,
the European mink is one of the most endangered animals
in Europe. The population has plummeted by over fifty in
the past decade, and although competition from the American mink

(04:19):
certainly isn't helping matters, European mink are also hunted by
humans and have long been the victims of human driven
habitat loss. Activists and researchers are working against the clock
to save the species. Meanwhile, mink farms flourish worldwide. Mink
accounts for eight of the global fur trade, and fur

(04:40):
is still a popular material in oaktor as recently as
two thirds of major Fall fashion week shows worldwide included
for the mink, fur industry in the United States grosses
around three hundred million dollars a year. There are farms
in twenty three states, but a few European countries outstrip

(05:00):
America's farmed for production. Meanwhile, the mink for business is
booming in China, a country with a lot of newly
wealthy citizens in the market for luxury items, coupled with
very few animal welfare regulations. But anti fur activists take
note simply releasing farmed mink into the wild won't do

(05:21):
the many favors. In two animal rights activists released between
thirty thousand and forty thousand mink from a fur farm
in Minnesota, most of the mink died immediately due to
heat or killed each other when recollected in different social groupings.
As with many issues, focusing on educating the public and
contacting your governmental representatives to help reform laws can help

(05:45):
the most. Today's episode is based on the article how
Humans have Made a Mess of Mink? On how stuff
Works dot com, written by Jocelyn Shields. Brain Stuff is
production of I Heart Radi in partnership with hows Toworks
dot com, and it's produced by Tyler Clang. Four more
podcasts from my Heart Radio visit the heart Radio app,

(06:07):
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.