NEWFOUNDLAND KEGULATIONS. 489 



I am now speaking of harp-seals. They are principally shot on the ice, 

 but when the ice packs they are killed with bats. When shot on open 

 or floating ice a large number of them escape into the water and die 

 from bleeding. 



I should say that for every seal shot and captured three escape 

 wounded to die in the water. I have seen ten seals on one pan shot 

 and wounded and all escaped. To kill and capture the seal the bullet 

 must lodge in the head; if it strikes any part of the body the seal will 

 manage to get to the edge of the pan and escape into the water. 1 

 know from my own knowledge that the number of seals brought in on 

 second trips is yearly decreasing, and that the fishery is being depleted 

 by the prosecution of this trip. Apart from the number of old, ma- 

 ture, and female seals destroyed, the hunting necessary for their cap- 

 ture prevents the male and female coming together as soon as they 

 otherwise would, and makes the whole species more wary and more 

 difficult to capture each year, so much so that even at a distance of 

 from 4 to 5 miles the smoke of a steamer blowing over the ice in the 

 direction of the seals will cause them immediately to leave the ice and 

 take to the water. 



On the first trip a good many seals are shot in the water, as at that 

 season of the year, the month of March, they are fat and will float, but 

 on the second trip, in April, they are seldom tired at in the water, for 

 if shot they immediately sink. Except you are very close to them and 

 very quick you can not secure one of them. 



The hood seals are generally in families — male, female, and young. 



Seals have been taken the past season on the east coast of Green- 

 land with S. S. G. shot in them. This kind of shot is only used by seal- 

 ers on the Newfoundland coast. 



I can not speak of the percentage of seals taken on a " second trip," 

 nor of the sex. Nearly all the seals taken are 

 bedlamers and old harps. The " second trip " Richard Pike, p. 592. 

 generally covers the month of April. Nearly all 

 seals taken on the "second trip" are shot on open and floating ice. 

 Very few are shot in the water, for if hit there is very little chance of 

 their capture, as they sink immediately. They are seldom or never 

 fired at in the water, for unless they are very close there is very little 

 chance of their being recovered. Fully one-third of the seals shot on 

 the ice are lost, for when wounded they manage to crawl to the edge 

 of the pan and into the water, and when once in the water they sink or 

 die from their wounds. 



Seals shot in the water in the month of March can be recovered, as 

 they are fat and in good condition, and float, but in the latter part of 

 April, when shot, they sink immediately. I am strongly against 

 " second trips," as in my opinion they are causing a rapid decline in 

 the industry, likely to lead to the extermination of the species by the 

 killing of old and mature seals, and the destruction caused by the use 

 of firearms. Some of the men resident in the northern harbors, who 

 have been engaged in the actual killing of the seal, can give more par- 

 ticular information as to the age and sex of the seals killed. The young 

 harp-seal takes to the water about the 25th of March, but when they 

 " ride " the ice and the ice closes they are killed by batting — that is, 

 when the ice is jammed and they can not escape into the water. 



