REPORT OF BRITISH COMMISSIONERS. 



235 



THK KI.AG. 



166 



[4 slialcu.] 

 Number of Seals and Sea-otters caught. 



Mtmorandum respeclhig Japanese Seal Fisheries. 



1. — WHKTHER THE DECLINE OK DESTRUCTION OF THE EISIIKRY IS ATTRIBUTARLE 

 TO THE SI,.\UGHTKR OF THE SEALS WHILE ON SHORE AT THEIR BREEDING-PLACES, 

 OR TO THEIR PURSUIT AT LARGE ON THE CIRCUM.JACENT OCEAN. 



1. The ouly kuown rookeries or hanliug groiiuds of the fur-seal witliiu Japanese 

 dominions are the following : 



Srednoi Rocks (off Ushisbia). 

 Raikoke Island. 

 Mushia Rocks. 



The first of these hanling grounds, all of which are situated in the Kuriles, is only 

 some 100 yards long by 60 yards wide, and the others are not much larger; but at 

 the time of their discovery in 1881 they must liave harboured annually some 20,000 or 

 25,000 fur-seals; 5,000 were actually taken there by one vessel in the year mentioned. 

 Since then they have gradually declined in jn-oductiveness, and it may be said that 

 at the present time they yield catches of only a few scores iu the place of thousands. 



There can be no doubt that this result is exclusively due to the indiscriminate 

 slaughter of the seals at their breeding place. No "rookery" could withstand for 

 many years such wholesale destruction as these were ex])Osed to in consequence of 

 the successful venture of 1881. Nor is there any other way of accounting tbr their 

 depletion, for it is known that the two or three foreign sealers which now find it 

 worth their while to equip at Yokohama do not engage in ])elagic sealing, but pro- 

 ceed to the more extensive haunts of their quarry bey(»nd .Jajiauese waters, such as 

 Robben, Behring, and Copper Islands, where they hope to elude the vigilance of the 

 Russian guard vessels. 



