216 



FUR-SEAL HERD OF ALASKA. 



present in considerable numbers. It 

 seems more likely tbat the advent of these 

 classes of seals depends upon their ages, 

 the earlier coming into heat earlier as 

 2-year olds, and bearing their jjups earlier 

 as 3-year-olds. 



(F. A. Lucas and Geo. A. Clark.) 

 (Fur Seal Investigations, part 2, 1898, 

 pp. 557, 566.) 



Lucas ^ says that the virgin or 

 2-year-old cows do not come on 

 the breeding rookeries. 



American Muse cm of 

 Natural History, 

 New York, February 18. 1912. 

 Dear Sir: Noticing your remark on 

 page 2168 of the Congressional Record for 

 February 14, I take the liberty of saying 

 that the weights of the sealskins (catches 

 1909 and 1910), as published by the Gov- 



1 Dr. Evermann. Dr. David Starr Jordan. His 

 associate, whose name I am now reading; "Dr. F. 

 A. Lucas, director of the American Museum of 

 Natural History, New York City, member of the 

 fur-seal commissions of 1896 and 1S97, when he spent 

 about four months on the Seal Islands, devoting the 

 entire time to a study of the rookeries and hauling 

 grounds. Dr. Lucas is one of the keenest and most 

 conservative of American zoologists." 



I confess that I quote Mr. Elliott with 

 some hesitancy, because, as I wrote the 

 honorable Mr. Sulzer, he does not know 

 the difference between a 2-year-old and 

 a 3-year-old seal. My reason for this 

 statement is that subsequent to 1890 Mr. 

 Elliott published a "field diagram," in 

 which he includes certain ,seals marked 

 "2-year-olds," or "nubiles." Two-year- 

 old females do not occur on the rookeries 

 and very few are on the islands in June. 

 The bulk of them arrive in July and 

 August after the rookery system has been 

 broken up, as is well show^l in photo- 

 graphs. The youngest seals in the 

 harems are 3-year-olds. 



I am, faithfully yours, 



F. A. Lucas. 

 Hon. Edward W. Townsend, 

 Committee on Foreign Affairs, 

 House of Representatives, 

 Washington, D. C. 



[Note. — Tliis letter confessing the 

 strange "scientific" ignorance of the 

 writer of the fact that those nubiles do 

 appear on the breeding rookeries when 

 the breeding season is not broken up, and 

 only appear then, is a sad revelation of 

 nonsense on the part of Lucas as an inves- 

 tigator. No breeding of any kind takes 

 place after that date or before, vdz, July 

 4-25 annually, to any noteworthy extent; 

 none whatever after August 1. — ■ 

 H. W. E.] 



But ' Jordan finds them there 

 just as EUiott found and described 

 them in 1872-1874. 



official journal of the government 

 agent's office. 



St. Paul Island, Alaska, 



Friday, July -J 1. 1896. 

 Dr. Jordan found two 2-year-old virgin 

 seal cows on the Reef Rookery, which he 

 killed for scientific research. 



' Dr. Evermann (reading): "Dr. David Starr 

 Jordan, president of Stanford University, chairman 

 of the fur-seal commissions of 1896 and 1897, and 

 who, in company with his associates, spent the 

 seasons of those two years on our Seal Islands and 

 on the Russian islands, visiting every rookery and 

 every hauUng groimd and studying the fur seal from 

 every important point of view. Besides spending 

 several mouths actually on the islands, he spent 

 many more months in "collating and studying the 

 data resulting from his own observations and those 

 of his associates and in a study of the literature of the 

 subject. 



"Mr. George A. Clark, of Stanford University, sec- 

 retary to the fur-seal commissions of 1896 and 1897 and 

 special investigator on the Seal Islands during the 

 entire sea^son of 1909. Mr. Clark has had a wider 

 experience in enumerating the seal herd than anj' 

 other man and is one of the most careful observers 

 who has ever visited the Seal Sslands." 



