14 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL 
There is a time therefore in each breed- 
ing season when all of the pups are 
absolutely within reach; and as there 
is a mother for each pup, a count of the 
pups is in effect an enumeration of the 
mothers — the breeding females — the 
all-important element in the herd. 
By the first of August each season, 
practically all of the fur-seal pups are 
born. About this time also the majority 
of the harem masters, who have fasted 
since their arrival in May, have with- 
drawn from the rookeries to feed at sea. 
The mother seal, while she will defend 
her pup of a few hours old with her life, 
pays no attention to it when it is a week 
or more old, betaking herself promptly 
to the sea when disturbed and leaving 
the pup to shift for itself. A very little 
urging therefore suffices to clear the 
rookeries of the older animals, leaving 
the young to be dealt with by themselves. 
The period is a limited one because 
when the fur-seal pups begin to take to 
the water the transition from a land 
animal to a water animal is very sudden 
and after the pups gain command of 
themselves in the water they take to it 
instantly when disturbed. There is 
however, a period of about ten days in 
early August when the pups can be con- 
trolled and counted. 
The fur-seal rookeries occupy about 
eight miles of shore front, generally in a 
narrow band twenty to fifty feet in width. 
At certain points there are massed areas. 
Each form of breeding ground has its 
own problems in the counting. The 
narrow beaches have holes and crevices 
among the rocks where the little animals 
hide. On the massed areas they can be 
more readily controlled, but there is 
danger of crowding and smothering. 
The difficulties in neither case are seri- 
ous and call merely for care and experi- 
ence in dealing with them. 
On the narrow beach portions, the 
process of counting is carried out by 
two persons, one passing along the sea- 
ward side of the rookery, the other on 
the landward side. Coming together 
they cut off a small group of twenty-five 
to one hundred pups and force them to 
run back along the beach twenty to 
fifty yards. These pups represent vary- 
ing ages and degrees of strength since 
they are born at different dates between 
the twelfth of June and the first of August 
and they therefore naturally line out in 
order of capacity to travel and this line 
can be readily counted. The process 
is like that of the counting of sheep as 
they pass through a narrow gate. 
Group by group the pups of a given 
rookery are counted. Between the pas- 
sage of the separate pods, or groups, the 
openings in the rocks are searched for 
hidden animals. Careful search is also 
made for the dead, a necessary part of 
the enumeration. The services of na- 
tive helpers who, preliminary to the 
work of counting have driven off the 
adult animals, are utilized at all times 
to keep the pods of counted animals 
from mingling with those not counted. 
Where massed groups occur they are 
rounded up and held loosely on some 
flat surface, a native guard being posted 
about, except at one point from which 
the animals are allowed to run off. 
These departing pups again travel 
readily in lines which can be counted 
by two’s and three’s and four’s. If 
tendency to stampede develops, a guard 
is thrown across the front and a new 
opening at some other point is estab- 
lished. By the above process, repeated 
and varied as conditions demanded, in a 
period of four hours, approximately 
eleven thousand fur-seal pups were 
handled and counted from the massed 
breeding ground under Hutchinson Hill 
on St. Paul Island in July, 1918. One 
of the accompanying photographs illus- 
