by the terms of the Treaty of 191 1, which made no provisions 

 for taking specimens. 



4) Bewildered by the numbers of seals on the breeding 

 grounds and their constant movement, he recommended that 

 "an intimate life history study of a single harem throughout a 

 summer" be made (Scheffer footnote 10, p. 223). 



5) He wrote that "determined efforts . . . should be made 

 to perfect a technique of airplane reconnaissance of the seal 

 grounds" (Scheffer footnote 10, p. 215). 



6) He was disturbed by a discrepancy between the observed 

 rate of increase in number of bachelors killed and the com- 

 puted rate of increase in number of breeding cows, the latter 

 rate being about three times the former (Scheffer footnote 10, 

 p. 219). He questioned the computation system and especially 

 the publication of its results in minute detail. As a visiting 

 British scientist wrote later: "The annually published compu- 

 tation, despite small textual disclaimers, has suggested to the 

 world a knowledge of the composition of the herd which goes 

 far beyond what is proven" (Bertram 1950:81). 



1941 



With the Fur Seal Treaty due to expire in October, the U.S. 

 Government made plans early in 1941 to investigate the food 

 habits and migration routes of fur seals at sea. The main pur- 

 pose was to find out how many Pribilof-born seals were win- 

 tering in waters off Japan, and what they were eating there. 

 The Secretary of the Interior wrote to the President on 7 

 March 1941 recommending that funds be made available to 

 support a sea-going vessel, a staff of five biologists, and cler- 

 ical help. The sum of $290,000 was appropriated on 30 June. 



On 7 March the Secretary of the Interior proposed to in- 

 crease the 1941 take of fur seals by about 30,000 as a step in the 

 direction of reducing the Pribilof herd. The kill was, in fact, 

 increased by 29,750 over that of the previous year (Bower 

 1943:47). 



When funds were appropriated, the following biological 

 staff was assembled: Victor B. Scheffer (in charge), A. Henry 

 Banner, Kelshaw Bonham, Wilbert M. Chapman, Donald D. 

 Shipley, and Ford Wilke. A 3-masted motor vessel, the Black 

 Douglas, was purchased and refitted for pelagic research. 

 When the United States entered World War 11 on 7 December 

 1941, the vessel was given to the U.S. Navy and all plans for 

 pelagic research were shelved. 



Meanwhile, during the summer and fall of 1941, Wilke and 

 Banner were carrying on research on the Pribilofs. Their main 

 accomplishments were: 1) Between 18 August and 16 Septem- 

 ber they counted 19,000 dead pups on all of the St. Paul 

 rookeries, representing a mortality of at least 4.2% (Kenyon et 

 al. 1954, table 11, p. 30). Here was the first evidence that pup 

 mortality was beginning to increase as a result of population 

 pressures. 2) Between 23 September and 8 October they 

 branded and tagged 10, (XX) pups, experimenting with different 

 tags and different tag positions on the body (Scheffer I950d:4, 

 9). From this experiment, the present monel metal tag applied 

 to the fore flipper evolved. (In 1941, 5,000 of the tags applied 

 were of stainless steel; this metal was not used again.) The 

 main purpose of the 1941 marking was to identify animals of 

 Pribilof origin, some of which could later be collected by the 

 Black Douglas biologists studying intermingling of seals off 

 Japan. Tags of the 1941 series were recovered over a period of 

 20 yr; four tagged females were observed in 1961. 



Sex was recorded at time of tagging for the 10,000 pups, and 

 also for 1,000 pups tagged in 1945. Sex was not recorded in 

 tagging operations after 1945. How accurate were the sex 

 determinations of 1941 and 1945? Of 511 seals recovered in 

 later years: 82% proved to be males correctly identified, 10% 

 proved to be females correctly identified, 1 seal proved to be a 

 male incorrectly identified, and 8% proved to be females in- 

 correctly identified. Thus, the only important mistake was in 

 identifying many male pups as females. 3) Between 7 October 

 and 7 November, they collected and measured 18 branded 

 yearlings. Their collection of skins and skulls is still the largest 

 for known-age yearlings. They started the "BDM" (Black 

 Douglas Mammal) catalog in which specimens are still being 

 listed. 4) They stood a 24-h watch on one of the rookeries and 

 learned that seals are active and vocal at night as well as day. 5) 

 They studied U.S. Weather Bureau records, and could find no 

 correlation between Bering Sea weather and the time of arrival 

 of bachelor seals in June and July. 6) They made the first col- 

 lection of genital tracts from known-age females: 6 tracts from 

 branded yearlings which were subsequently sent, we believe, to 

 Robert K. Enders. 7) In late November and early December 

 they experimented with snaring and crating live fur seals. Ten 

 crated seals left St. Paul Island by boat on 1 1 December, but 

 only seven arrived, somewhat the worse for wear, in Seattle on 

 3 January 1942. They were placed in the Seattle Zoo on the 

 same day (Anonymous 1942). One survived for as long as 110 

 d. This one "fed heavily for a 47-day period during which its 

 average daily consumption of fish was 5.73 pounds or 14 per- 

 cent of its weighted average body weight" (Bonham 1943). 

 Here was the first attempt to estimate the food consumption of 

 the fur seal. 



Leon J. Cole collected seal pituitaries on St. Paul Island in 

 the summer of 1941 and sent them to Roland K. Meyer (both 

 men from the University of Washington). Scheffer collected 13 

 pituitaries in 1946 and sent them to Robert K. Enders. We do 

 not know the fate of any of these specimens. 



The Fur Seal Treaty expired on 23 October 1941. By an ex- 

 change of notes between the United States and the Dominion 

 of Canada, a provisional arrangement was made on 19 Decem- 

 ber 1942, in which the United States was to receive 80% and 

 Canada 20% of the annual sealskin take. A domestic Fur Seal 

 Act embodying all important features of previous protective 

 legislation was signed by the President on 26 February 1944 

 (Public Law 237, 78th Congress, Chapter 65, 2nd Session). 

 The provisional agreement remained in effect until 1957. An 

 important feature of the 1944 Fur Seal Act was that it provided 

 for the killing of fur seals "for scientific purposes under 

 special permit issued therefor by the Secretary (of the 

 Interior)" (Section 16). It also required each party to report at 

 the end of each calendar year the number of seals taken for 

 research use, and the data obtained from them. Such a report, 

 usually consisting of from one to three pages, was submitted 

 annually by the United States (and we presume by Canada 

 also) through 1956. 



1942 



In the spring of 1942, the Aleutian Islands became an active 

 war theater. By military order, the residents of the Pribilof 

 Islands were moved on 16 June and were relocated in Funter 

 Bay, southeastern Alaska. (Roy D. Hurd was, for a week, the 



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