142 PATAGONIAN EXPEDITIONS: ZOOLOGY. 



shot a female fur seal, killing it instantly. Before we could get the hook 

 on it, it sank below our reach, although only three boat-lengths away 

 when shot. The water was perfectly clear and we could see the animal 

 sinking when we reached the bloody spot on the water. It began to sink 

 immediately when shot. With an extra long hook we might have reached 

 it. We remained in the neighborhood for an hour, but no more seals 

 were seen. While lying to with the vessel about two miles off this point 

 the Captain saw two fur seals from the vessel, but was powerless to try 

 getting them. It was on the rocks at this point that Capt. Hunt had 

 killed a pup fur seal the year before (1891).' 



" In addition to his own observations Mr. Townsend collected from 

 California sealers some very important information respecting the abund- 

 ance of the Guadalupe fur-seal and the numbers killed in recent years. 

 This may be summed up as follows : 



"In 1880 Capt. Geo. W. Chase, of San Diego, made several trips to 

 Guadalupe for fur-seals, which he found 'tightly packed in the caves and 

 holes [in the rocks].' He generally fired at their eyes in the darkness of 

 these places, but sometimes used candles. His skins sold for $15 each, 

 from which he made ^2,200 in 1880. The same man (Capt. Chase) stated 

 that about a year earlier a Mr. Borges sold his catch of Guadalupe seal- 

 skins at San Francisco for over ^20,000 (the rate being %\q to $15 per 

 skin). 



"In 1883 Capt. Geo. E. Wentworth killed about 2,000 fur-seals on 

 Guadalupe. Captain Wentworth states that several other vessels were 

 there at the same time, and that the Guadalupe fur-seal was practically 

 [commercially] exterminated that year — 1883. 



"In 1890 Capt. Nelson told Mr. Townsend that he had killed fur-seals 

 with more or less regularity every year on the exposed shingle beach at 

 the northwest end of Guadalupe Island, where he pursued them into the 

 caves and killed them with clubs. 



" In 1 89 1 Geo. M. Hunt, of San Diego, visited Guadalupe in December 

 for the purpose of sealing and killed 5 fur-seals — 4 adults on the east 

 side and one pup on the northwest side. A few others were seen off 

 shore." 



In a paper published by Mr. Townsend in 1899,^ he gives (/. c, p. 272) 



' Pelagic Sealing with Notes on the Fur Seals of Guadalupe, the Galapagos, and Lobos 

 Islands. By Charles H. Townsend, U. S. Fish Commission. The Fur Seals and Fur-Seal 

 Islands of the North Pacific Ocean (Jordan), Part III, 1899, pp. 223-274, pll. xxii-xxxv. 



