CAUSE OF DEATH OF PUPS. 479 



Q. How do you account for so many dead pints'? — A. I think their 

 mothers were killed in the sea by the poachers 



while away from the islands in search of food. Koen Mandregin et al., 

 Q. Why do you think that they were killed by v- 140. 

 poachers? — A. I was once on board a schooner 



which was seized at Northeast Point and saw a number of female skins 

 on board. 



Q. How do you account for this? — A. 1 think the cows were killed 

 by the poachers while away from the rookeries, 



and as mother seals nurse none but their own Anton Melovedoff,p.i39. 

 young, consequently the pups whose mothers were 

 killed die from starvation. 



And I saw many of them opened, and in all cases there was not a 

 sign of food in their stomachs. I never seen a 

 pup that had a mother living to suckle it look poor A. Melovedoff, p. 143. 

 or sick or starved ; nor did I ever see or hear of a 



sick or diseased seal, although I have eaten the flesh of the fur-seal 

 all my life, and it is and has ever been the staple meat ration of our 

 people. 



Seal meat is cooked at the company house every day while seals are 

 to be had, and it is eaten by all the white men on the island. Men talk 

 of epidemics among seals and of impotent bulls on the rookeries, but 

 those who have spent a lifetime on the seal islands, and whose business 

 and duty it has been to guard and observe them, have no knowledge of 

 the existence of either. 



And when they were examined by the physician I was present, and 

 I saw them cut open and their stomachs were . 

 empty and not a sign of milk in them. Simeon Melovidov, p. U6. 



The only solution of the problem is, in my opinion, that the cows or 

 mother seals go into the sea to feed, and while they are there they are 

 shot and killed by pelagic hunters, and the pups, deprived of suste- 

 nance, die upon the rookeries. 



Until 1891 we were allowed several thousand pup seals for food, and 

 I have often killed them, and saw others killing them, and they were 

 always full of milk. The pups found dead upon the rookeries are 

 always poor and thin and starved and empty. * * * 



The flesh of the fur-seal has been eaten by our people ever since 

 their first settling here, and it constitutes the chief part of their daily 

 food, and it is eaten regularly by every white man on the island; and 

 yet no one here has ever seen or heard tell of a sick or diseased seal. 



The seals are never visited by physical disorders of any kind, so far 

 as I could ascertain, and I have never seen on 



their bodies any blemishes, humors or eruptions John M. Morton, p. 68. 

 which might be attributed to disease. 



These latter pups I examined, and they seemed to be very much 

 emaciated. In my opinion they died of starva- 

 tion, caused by the mothers having been shot J- H. Moulton, p. 71. 

 while absent from the islands feeding. Another 



cause of their starving is because a cow refuses to give suck to any 

 pup but her own, and she recognizes her offspring by its cry, distin- 

 guishing its voice from that of hundreds of others which are constantly 

 bleating. 



