COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS OF DATA 171 



Difficulties have been met with in interpreting some of the forms. Sometimes they 

 have not been filled in with sufficient care, and sometimes, especially in those from the 

 South Shetlands, the gunners have used place-names of their own which are not to be 

 found on any chart. For one reason or another we have had to reject numerous forms 

 as unintelligible, with the result that the number of positions recorded for any season is 

 much below the total number of whales actually killed. 



In working up the data the positions were in the first place plotted, with due allowance 

 for magnetic variation, on large-scale charts, separate sheets being used for Fin and 

 Blue whales and for each month of the season. These charts were then divided up into 

 squares of convenient size and the number of whales killed in each square was counted. 

 For the South Georgia grounds the area of each square was a quarter degree of latitude 

 and half a degree of longitude (15 x 17-4 miles = 261 sq. miles). In the South Shetland 

 area, which is much larger, each square was half a degree of latitude and a whole degree 

 of longitude (30 x 27-6 miles = 828 sq. miles). Contours have been drawn^ on the 

 assumption that the number of whales in any one square was concentrated at its centre, 

 and it is these charts which are here reproduced on a greatly reduced scale.^ By this 

 method it is easy to prepare charts which will represent the total monthly captures 

 throughout the series of seasons, or, indeed, to summarize the whole of the records for 

 one species on a single chart. Such combined charts may show interesting features, but 

 the variation from one season to another is sometimes so great at South Georgia that 

 monthly totals cannot be employed to advantage. 



Owing to an error in the original instructions Blue whales were not distinguished from 

 Fin whales in the South Georgia returns for the first half of season 1922-3. The records 

 for this season have therefore been omitted, the data covering eight seasons, from 1923-4 

 to 1930-1 inclusive. For this period we have been able to chart 29,266 positions, and of 

 these 16,005 relate to Fin whales and 13,261 to Blue whales. The numbers for each 

 month are shown in Tables I and II, with the totals for each season and the total number 

 taken in each season by the combined South Georgia companies. 



Data are available from the South Shetlands since 1922-3, but in recent years the 

 returns are not satisfactory owing to the new methods which the whalers have adopted. 

 Prior to 1927-8 the factories were moored throughout the season in one or other of the 

 harbours situated in the South Shetlands and Palmer Archipelago. If the fleet en- 

 countered heavy pack-ice when approaching the islands in the spring, it often worked 

 for a short time along the ice-edge in the neighbourhood, moving into Bransfield Strait, 

 and to Admiralty Bay or Deception Island, as soon as the ice permitted. In 1927-8, 

 however, more ambitious pelagic operations began, and on an increasingly large scale. 



^ Charts for individual seasons are contoured by tens up to fifty; those for monthly totals over the whole 

 series of seasons by twenties up to one hundred; those for grand totals by hundreds up to five hundred. 



^ Recent surveys, made during the course of the Discovery Investigations, have led to considerable 

 revision of the coast line of South Georgia and the South Shetlands, and the alterations are incorporated in 

 the latest Admiralty charts. The work of plotting the data presented in this paper began before these surveys 

 were completed; the earlier charts have thus been used and we have thought it best to reproduce these in 

 their original form, without the recent modifications. 



