530 THE FUR SEALS OF THE PRIBILOF ISLANDS. 



also a hundred or more bachelors in the regular hauling ground back of the slope. 

 None have been seen here before this year. The ground occupied by idle bulls here 

 is now more fully occupied than it was at any time last season. It was with great 

 difficulty that I got to the observation point to-day which I reached without trouble 

 on the 16th. 



There are 395 bulls idle and in places where harems were last season on Tolstoi. 

 This count will doubtless be of little value, as it is difficult to get at any distinction 

 between the idle bulls and those likely to have harems. The bulls on the sand flat 

 about the point where the excessive mortality occurred last year are inordinately thick. 

 They seem literally to cover the ground. This will probably result in the usual 

 excessive fighting and consequent trampling of pups. At one or two points on the 

 sand flat single cows are located even to the edge of the cliff. The majority of the 

 cows on Tolstoi, however, are located on the bowlder beach, which is rapidly filling up. 



When we consider that through these harems must pass the great mass of cows 

 that are to fill the sand flat, it is easy to see why this rocky beach is almost if not quite 

 as much of a "death trap" as the flat itself. It was evidently from here that the 

 windrow of dead pups washed up on the beach came last fall. 



One instance of copulation, the first of the season, was witnessed at the farther 

 end of the sand flat. The cow was a single one, and her pup seemed, by comparison 

 with other pups whose age we know, to be about 3 days old. It might be a week. I 

 do not know anything about the arrival of the cow or the birth of her pup. She was 

 not present, however, at the time of my visit on the 16th. 



The salt lagoon is rapidly filling up or else the tides are unusually low just now. 



JUNE 23. 



The schooner Louise J. Kenney, of Seattle, bound for the Arctic on a trading- 

 voyage, sailed in close to the east side of Beef peninsula at 4 o'clock this morning and 

 drifted south before the wind past Sivutch Rock, coming in to the village landing. 

 Mr. Miner Bruce and his wife came ashore for a few minutes. 



Drives were made this morning from 27oltoi, Beef, and Lukanin. A total of 708 

 were killed; 184 were rejected as too small; 556 as too large. No accidents occurred. 



It is to be regretted that so many young bulls escape killing under the modus 

 vivendi. There are already more adult bulls than are needed, and these young fellows 

 will simply add to the confusion and destruction of cows and pups. 



1 had a young bull with defective fur knocked down and skinned. This is a 

 blemish in the skin similar to that in the cow skin taken last year. There are certainly 

 many of these animals, and whatever may be the cause they should be weeded out. 



In the salt house 60 skins in two lots of 30 each were weighed. One lot averaged 

 7.7 pounds per skin. 



In regard to the turning back of large seals, it must be remembered that last year, 

 on the 25th of July, from a combined drive of these same rookeries, 1,008 large and 

 1,177 small seals were turned back. The small seals are not present yet in large 

 numbers, while it is safe to say that all of the large ones turned back to-day were 

 among the number rejected in July of last year. 



I visited Lukanin and Kitovi rookeries in the afternoon. The Amphitheater has 

 still its 46 bulls. There are 37 cows It is not possible to get a correct count of the 

 pups. 



