224 Fortieth Annual Meeting 



upon it in this way: if tliose animals are to be placed with 

 us we must jump into the game and do the best we can 

 with them, and we are going to try to do that. The Depart- 

 ment has already issued a set of regulations under which 

 certain of the fur-bearing animals may be killed. All sorts 

 of protests and commendations have been received already 

 from various parts of Alaska. From the same region have 

 come protests from some people that the closed season for 

 the muskrat is absolutely ruinous to the Indians in that 

 region, because they could not catch a muskrat during the 

 open season, and from other people come other protests 

 saying the open season is too long, that we should begin a 

 month later in the fall and close a month earlier in the 

 spring; all of which suggests that the regulations may not 

 be very far from right. 



You will be interested, I think, in some specific features 

 in the regulations. The sea otter is the most valuable fur- 

 bearing animal in the world. Last year, I believe, the total 

 catch in Alaska was 37 skins. When the pelt of an animal 

 is worth $250 to $800 it is going to be sought for most 

 assiduously ; and the seeking for sea otters in Alaska last 

 year by the hundreds of Indians, squaw men and others, 

 resulted in the capture of only 37. That is significant of 

 this fact, that the sea otter is getting pretty scarce and needs 

 protection. So one of the regulations establishes a closed 

 season on the sea otter from now until November 1, 1920; 

 and we have also established a closed period for five years 

 on the beaver, which is getting scarce in Alaska. Informa- 

 tion received from the various Canadian provinces shows 

 that closed periods there have worked wonderfully well, in 

 Assiniboia, Saskatchewan and those regions. Then a closed 

 season is made each year in the case of the minor fur-bear- 

 ing animals. 



The first circular that was issued this year will be modified 

 from time to time so as to square with the increased infor- 

 mation that we get from time to time. But it is certain 

 that this minor fur-bearing animal proposition is one of the 



