FUR-SEAL INDUSTRY OF ALASKA. 



was also given to the Senate subcommittee in charge of Alaskan 

 affairs, of which Senator Dillingham was chairman, on March 8, 1904. 

 (See p. 235, hearing No. 1, Jan. 17, 1914, House Committee on Ex- 

 penditures in the Department of Commerce.) 



It is conceded on all sides that the sex in young seals can not be 

 told apart when they appear on the islands and that they are born 

 equal in number. (See p. 182, hearing No. 1.) 



In the judgment of the committee this raises a strong presumption 

 that half of the yearlings so taken were females, which is made a 

 crime under the statute. 



This method of taking seals continued until the end of the killing 

 season of 1909, the termination of the lease. After that the business 

 was conducted by the Government under the direction of Hon. 

 Charles Nagel, then Secretary of Commerce and Labor. 



VII. The committee finds that the taking of seals on the Pribilof 

 Islands, under the direction of former Secretary Charles Nagel, from 

 1910 to 1912, inclusive, was conducted in the same manner, and by 

 the same officials, as in the latter years of the leasing company. 

 Before the said Charles Nagel had full authority under law to take 

 seals on the islands, and during the last year of the lease, he was 

 repeatedly notified of the unlawful killing and depredations com- 

 mitted by the sealing company, and the Government agents on the 

 Pribilof Islands, with records of such work, during the years of 1906, 

 1907, and 1908; he was warned April 26, 1909, that they would be 

 guilty again, under his direction, of the same conduct. This warning 

 was disregarded; the same leasing parties were on the islands in 1909, 

 and took, in violation of law and regulation, 7,2.30 small pups and 

 extra small pups, which were yearlings, and exclusively the property 

 of the Government. 



The committee further finds that the said Charles Nagel, on May 

 7, 1909, appointed George A. Clark, as a special expert assistant to 

 visit the islands, examine conditions, and make a report to the depart- 

 ment, which he did September 30, 1909. In said report the special 

 assistant aforesaid states that yearlings are taken, and "no seal is 

 too small to be killed," to wit: 



It is on the killing field, however, that the great need of a guiding and controlling 

 hand is shown. In 1896-97 the Government agents ordered the drives. This season 

 they have been entirely in the hands of the lessees. The young males set aside for 

 breeding purposes having been marked, the lessees have been free to take what they 

 could get, and this resulted in their taking practically all of the bachelors appearing 

 on the hauling grounds. 



* * * With a fixed legal quota, and a limited time in which to secure it from a 

 failing herd, there naturally results close, severe driving. In the eagerness to see that 

 no possible bachelor escapes, the edges of the rookies are encroached upon and cows 

 included in the drives. Fifty of them appeared in drives toward the close of this 

 season. A drive that can not be made without including cows should be omitted. 

 A drive which appears on the killing field with 15 to 20 cows in it should be released 

 rather than incur the danger of clubbing any such cow by mistake. There should be 

 some one in charge of the herd with power and discretion to do this. With a limited 

 killing season, however, this would be unfair to the lessees. There should also be 

 power and discretion to waive the limit and extend the time of killing if in-cessary. 



There has been on the killing grounds since 1900 a constant struggle on the part of 

 the leasing company in the closing years of its concession to get every possible skin 

 from the declining herd. Its work has been aided by a high arbitrary legal quota and 

 by a lowered minimum weight of skin, enabling it to gradually anticipate the quotas 

 of succeeding years by killing younger animals. As a result there has occurred in 

 these years probably the closest killing to which the herd has ever been subjected. 

 Aside from the diminished supply of male life on the breeding grounds in 1904, this 



