22 FUR-SEAL FISHERIES OF ALASKA IN 1910. 



Count op Harems and Idle Bulls on St. George Island, 1910. 



a Includes hauling-ground bulls. 



A summary of the number of bulls on both islands, with a com- 

 parison of the number found in 1909, follows: 



Summary of Bulls on St. Paul and St. George Islands, 1910. 



a Estimated. 



Compared with 1909 the number of harems on both islands has 

 decreased 18, or 1.3 per cent, an inappreciable decrease when con- 

 trasted with that which has occurred annually for years'. Tins de- 

 crease in harems can not be laid to a scarcity of bulls, as can easily 

 be proved, but to a lack of enough cows to provide other bulls with 

 harems. 



On the other hand the number of idle bulls — that is to say, those 

 mature adult males stationed on rookeries waiting for cows — has been 

 increased from 172 to 221, or a gain of 29 per cent. This is the result 

 of the saving of young males by marking and of further restrictions 

 upon killing, commenced in 1904. 



The number of 7-year old males or "quitters," so termed because 

 of their tendency while idle to desert their stations when approached 

 by man, has decreased from 139 to 82; the number of water bulls has 

 increased from 13 to 55, and of the hauling-ground bulls there has 

 been a decrease from 98 to 47. As these latter classes are more or 

 less unstable and as some of each class could have been in the water 

 at the time these counts were made, it is not attempted to ascribe 

 specific reasons for the fluctuations in them. The fact is demon- 

 strated, however, that young bulls are present in fair numbers. The 

 further fact that 13 per cent of the stationed bulls, excluding quitters, 



