WHALING IN SCOTLAND 



ii 



BAUENOPTERA MUSCULUS. 



For comparison I add the table from my paper in the July "Annals.' 



The first thing to notice is that these whales are much fewer 

 than last year, their size smaller, and cows are more numerous than 

 bulls. The reason of the first is from the invasion of B. borealis, 

 which comes nearer land than the Finner, and the latter will not 

 associate with the former. Occasionally a small Finner will be 

 found near them, but the adult Finner keeps away from B. borealis. 

 One captain of a whaler told me there was a regular belt of water 

 (in which there were plenty of herrings) between the two whales. 

 The B. borealis left about iSth July, and then Finners came back. 

 I attribute the smaller size to differences in the measurement. 

 Hjort gives the size of B. imiscitlus as "60-65 f eet > seldom over 70 

 feet." Why the proportion of the sexes has changed I can only say 

 that I do not know. In 1904 there were, out of 226 Finner 

 whales, 60 per cent of bulls and 40 per cent of cows. It is not 

 that whales are getting fewer, for the captain of a steamer coming 

 from Iceland told me that for some 40 miles between Iceland and 

 Faroe he passed thousands of Finner whales ; he said they were 

 blowing all round the ship as far as he could see. Whaling was 

 just about over at the time. I tried to get the proportion of the 

 sexes from foetuses. Out of 19, 1 1 were bulls and 8 cows, or 

 about 58 bulls per cent, but the number is too small for much use. 

 I counted the baleen plates in a large Finner 71 feet long. 

 I took the right side to show the difference in colour. The first 

 anterior 170 plates were yellow, and the 207 posterior plates were 

 grey; total, 377 plates. The number of plates varies with the 

 individual whale. 



