SEAL LIFE ON THE PRIBILOF ISLANDS. 41 
of uncertainty the master’s report was given the benefit of the doubt. 
As a result of the corrections made in the masters’ reports of the spring 
catch for 1895, the records of the Bering Sea catch, made a few months 
later, were kept more carefully. There being still considerable misrep- 
resentation, masters of vessels, when licensed for sealing, should be 
cautioned against making incorrect returns, for which the authorities 
should accept no excuse. The facts of the case are apparent. The 
skinning of seals in canoes by Indians makes the tally of the sexes of 
skins thrown on the decks of sealing vessels after nightfall uncertain, 
while the falsity of all statements of a majority of males is self-evident. 
It could be demonstrated in many ways. Take, for example, the well- 
known conditions existing on the Pribilof Islands; the breeding males 
do not leave the islands—in fact, do not enter the water—during the 
breeding season, while the surplus males resulting from the polygamous 
nature of the seal have always been in large part removed by annual 
killings upon the islands. Females must, therefore, necessarily con- 
stitute the great bulk of the pelagic catch. Out of atotal of 123 seals 
examined at random by me upon the decks of sealing vessels in Bering 
Sea during the past season, 106 were females, or five-sixths of the 
whole number. The starvation of young seals upon the rookeries that 
follows the operations of the sealing fleet in Bering Sea is also evidence 
as to the sex of the seals killed. The loss of young seals up to Octo- 
ber 10 is reported to be 28,066 by actual count, while many were then 
found in a dying condition.! 
SEX, AGE, PREGNANCY, AND FOOD OF FUR SEALS TAKEN IN 
BERING SEA DURING AUGUST, 1895. 
During the cruise of the steamer Albatross on the pelagic sealing 
grounds in August, 1895, many carcasses of fur seals, obtained from 
day to day from vessels engaged in sealing, were examined with refer- 
ence to their age, sex, breeding condition, and food. Such carcasses 
were readily secured from schooners after the return of the hunting 
boats, while the evening work of skinning was going on, and all of 
those obtained were conveyed to the laboratory of the Albatross for 
dissection and examination. Of a total of 123 so examined in different 
localities from August 11 to 21, 106 were of femaleseals. Of the latter 
number 78 were nursing females, all determinations being based on 
examinations of mammary glands, uteri, and ovaries. Of the remain- 
ing females, 26 in number, 15 were yearlings and 11 were 2 years old. 
Of the males, 17 in number, 2 were yearlings, 4 were 2 years old, Swere 
3 years old, and 3 were 4 years old. Nearly five-sixths of the whole 
number being females, and nearly four-fifths of these being females in 
milk, the heavy drain made by pelagic sealing upon the producing class 
of seals is apparent. 
Only one of the 15 yearling females bore signs of recent impregna- 
tion, and this one, taken for a yearling on account of its small size, 
may have been 2 years old. Four of the 2-year-old females were preg- 
nant, one showing the corpus luteum in the right and the others in the 
left ovary. The breeding season not being over, the other 2-year-old 
females may have been impregnated later. A few nursing females not 
bearing marks of present pregnancy may have been impregnated and 

1As this report goes to press I am officially informed that the sealing schooner 
Penelope on February 29, 1896, entered at San Francisco a catch of 215 seals, of which 
only 8 were males, all the rest—207—being females. ‘The catch was made from Jan- 
uary 24 to February 26, between the Farallone Islands and Point Conception, Cal., 
at distances averaging 25 miles off shore.—C. H. T., March 12, 1896. 
