274 NORTH AMERICAN FAUNA 61, FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE 



Bears should have no difficulty reaching any of these islands, 

 because residents of Unimak Island stated that bears have been 

 known to swim across Isanotski Strait, from the Alaska Penin- 

 sula. 



I have not had firsthand experience with this Kodiak bear, but 

 undoubtedly its habits are quite similar to those of the Alaska 

 Peninsula bears. At times, the bears have interfered with do- 

 mestic stock raising on Kodiak Island, but I have no recent in- 

 formation, and there is no report based on consistent study of 

 the question. 



Thalarctos maritimus: Polar Bear 

 Thalarctos maritimus maritimus 



Information on the occurrence of the polar bear in the Aleutian 

 district is vague and unsatisfactory. In volume 2 of "Voyages of 

 Captain James Cook", mention is made of white bear skins seen 

 in Prince William Sound, in May 1778. Evermann (1922) lists 

 the polar bear among the marine mammals of the Pacific. They 

 have been known to occur on the Pribilofs, and Preble and McAtee 

 ( 1923) quote W. L. Hahn to the effect that the latter had found in 

 the St. Paul Island log, "under date of September 20, 1874, an 

 entry stating that a party visited the cave on Bogoslof and brought 

 back a bear skull known to have been there since the time of the 

 first occupation of the island." 



This is the most definite record we have for the Aleutian dis- 

 trict, though St. Paul is several hundred miles north of the chain. 

 Polar bears could visit the Aleutians or Alaska Peninsula only by 

 means of ice floes drifting south — no doubt this is possible, but it 

 would be a rare occurrence. 



Family PROCYONIDAE 



Procyon lotor: Raccoon 



Turner (1886) reported, "I have heard, on what I consider 

 reliable authority, that the Raccoon is not uncommon in the 

 south portions of the Alaskan mainland." 



Such occurrence has not been substantiated. However, in 1936, 

 it was learned that A. W. Bennett and A. C. Bryant were 

 operating a blue-fox farm on Long Island, near Kodiak. A num- 

 ber of years previously they had stocked the little island with 

 raccoons from Wisconsin, Minnesota, Michigan, and North Da- 

 kota. In the years 1932, 1933, and 1934, dead raccoons had been 



