106 THE FISHERIES OF THE UNITED STATES. 



not noticed by him again ; she goes np to his seraglio-grounds, to and from the sea, seeking her young and feeding 

 undisturbed for the balance of the time; also, that the other bulls seem to recognize this condition of passed sexual 

 requirement and satisfaction, in her case, by paying her no further attention. 



Period of gestation. — Thus it is apparent that the period of gestation in the fur-seal is nearly, lacking a 

 few days, twelve calendar months; for, the next year finds her again heavy with young, at almost exactly the same 

 day that she gave birth to her previous offspring in the prior season. The systematic and regular appearance of 

 the females every year upon the Pribylov islands at such a time, usually in late June and early July, without the 

 slightest regard to what the weather may have been during the winter and spring previous, or is when they land, 

 establishes without doubt this exact limit of their gestation. 



Importance of this service. — The reason why I dwell upon these details, is because they have a very 

 important bearing upon the question as to what ratio of males every year is needed for service on this great breeding- 

 ground of Bering sea. If the common opinion, hitherto entertained, was tenable, of free and effective pelagic 

 coition, then it will be readily understood that nearly all the males from four years up, could have easy access to the 

 females ; and, that it would be a matter of very small concern how many old males, or rather those males upon the 

 land located over the rookeries, were fit for service. But, understanding, as I now do, without a shadow of tenable 

 contradiction, that these "seecatchie" which receive, fight for, and cover the females on the rookeries, are the 

 only active fertilizing powers toward the reproduction and perpetuation of their kind, the importance of my detailed 

 description of the method of coition is evident; for it shows conclusively, that unless we see every year, long prior 

 to the arrival of the females, a full supply of able-bodied " seecatchie" holding out upon and located over the 

 rookeries of St. Paul and St. George — unless we see such a number in good condition — we may safely count upon the 

 fact that danger will arise of imperfect and nugatory fertilization for the coming year. It will not do to indulge the 

 hope, should a scarcity or diminution of the old males ever occur, when the rookeries are mapped out in spring, of 

 the deficiency being made good by the young males which are swimming around everywhere in the water. 



Vitality of the male. — I believe that an able-bodied adult "seecatchie" is capable of serving well froin 

 the 14th June to the 14th July, during which period the height of the breeding-season occurs, one hundred 

 females. If he is, however, as he frequently is, enfeebled by previous fighting and struggling with other males to 

 hold the station which he has selected and fought for, it is more than likely that his virility will not extend beyond 

 the proper serving of twenty or thirty cows. As I have said in another place, I found great difficulty in settling, to 

 my own satisfaction, a fair number of females as the average to every harem on the rookery. * Some instances occur 

 where the male treats forty-five or fifty females, owing to the peculiar configuration of the landing-grounds; but 

 most generally, and as the rule, I think fifteen or twenty cows to every bull is a true computation; hence, I do not 

 believe that under any normal circumstances and all normal disadvantages, such as fighting involves by weakening 

 the males, that, when the females arrive, there is the least risk of a single oue of them getting back to the water 

 without a perfect and effectual impregnation. A common opinion was prevalent on the islands among the employes 

 touching this matter, that, when the female was not instantly covered during her first heat, she went to the water, 

 cooled off, and on returning, sexual desire never reappeared; and thus she became a farrow or barren cow from that 

 time to the end of her natural life. Analogous physiology confutes this completely; that such warm-blooded, highly- 

 organized creatures should never have a rapid recurrence of sexual desire, in common with all other animals of their 

 class, until it is gratified in the usual way, is not at all probable, though it may be possible. 



Small number of barren females. — To show, however, that a very small proportion of the myriads of 

 breeding females are barren, I have only to present this illustration, which is happy in its conclusion, and easily 

 portrayed: whenever a female ceases to breed she refuses to haul upon the rookeries; she roams with the 

 "holluschickie", or the "bachelors", growing a third heavier and marked with corresponding darker tones to her 

 coat, yet still preserving the familiar pattern of the " matkah", so that she can be picked out quickly by an experienced 

 eye from the old and young males around her. In driving the " holluschickie" up to the killing-grounds every season, 

 the natives noticed, and pointed out to me, those barren cows in the drive, several of which were secured for my 

 examination, and measurement ; but the proportion of sterile females is not more than one in a thousand to the 

 "holluschickie" with which they consort, 



* This striking an accurate average is still further complicated by that unknown distribution of the virgin females that come up 

 to the rookeries every year for their first meeting with the virile males. What, proportion of them reach the rear of the breeding-grounds, 

 compared with their numbers which are served at the water-line? I surely am at fault to say, for they do not leave that tangible evidence 

 which the other older cows do in the forms of their young. One of the curious contradictions to generally received ideas of the habit of 

 seals is the fact, that the fur-seal will not rest either upon snow, or ice; it seems to positively avoid all contact with both of those 

 substances upon which the Phocidce wholly, and the sea-lions to some degree, delight in hauling over. CallorMnus has the warmest of 

 seal-coats, by all odds, yet it dreads a snowy or an icy bed with as much sincerity as any habitue' of the tropics can. The sea-lions and 

 hair-seals have often been surprised in sporting, or sleeping on the ice floes of Bering sea in the spring, by whalemen while cruising at the 

 edge of the frozen pack, wailing for the channel to open, clear, into the Arctic ocean; as neither Etimetopias nor Phoca have any under 

 wool, their sea-jackets are not half as heavy as those peculiar to the bodies of fur-seals; hence in taking personal notice of this odd aversion 

 of the Callorhinua to snow and ice, I believe that its dislike is one of pure sentimentality rather than one based on physical inability to 

 rest upon as cold surfaces; for there is not much difference between the water's temperature and (bat of tie' snow and ice in the spring — 

 10° Fahr., perhaps — both cold enough at till events. 



