THE RUSSIAN FUR-SEAL, ISLANDS. 65 



the number of females in the individual liarem fluctuates between and the niaxiuuun, 

 according to tlie time of day or condition of weather. Thus, on the Kith of .Inly, on 

 the same rookery, I counteil a harem having 10 females, which, upon a recount a few 

 hours later, contained 23, •' while some of the other bulls were entirely deserted.'" 



I have above alluded to the difficulty of discriminating" at a great distance 

 between the females and the killable bachelors when mixed on the breeding ground. 

 The difficulty is not conhned to these two classes alone. The experts jirofess to be 

 able to separate the bachelors into yearlings, 2-yearolds, 3-year-olds, 4 year-olds, and 

 5-year-olds, and in the descriptions and discussions we find these classes mentioned 

 in such a way as to lead to the impression that they are easily recognized on the 

 rookery or the killing-ground, but nothing can be further from the facts. With 

 lauidreds of dead seals before me, I have been unable to draw any line between tlie 

 various ages, nor has anybody present been able to point them out to me. 



] have submitted elsewhere in this report a series of weights of skins (p. 1<)!I) 

 which shows beyond a question that there is an unbroken series of all sizes from the 

 smallest to the largest. The whole question resolves itself into a mental sorting 

 of the killable seals into a number of classes, calling the smallest two-year-olds, the 

 largest Hve-year-olds, and roughly distributing those in between among their respec- 

 tive classes. The yearlings, however, form a fairly well-marked class by themselves, 

 as do, of course, the bulls — features not apparent in the tables of skin weights alluded 

 to, from the fact that these classes are not killed. 



The fact that even the natives are not always able to tell the females from the 

 bachelors on the rookeries was curiously proven to me one day at Glinka, Copper 

 Island, when Aleksander Zaikof and the chief, Sergei Sushkof, had a somewhat 

 heated coutroversy over the question whether a certain body of seals on the rJrili 

 Kamen Kookery consisted of bachelors or females. Both of the men are among the 

 most experienced and intelligent on the island. Yet it was only bec^ause Sushkof 

 had been stationed the wh(dc season at Glinka, while Zaikof only arrived with us 

 the day previous, that he was regarded to be in the right. 



But even at closer range it is sometimes difficult to distinguish the sexes. On 

 the killing-ground, where the teeth of tlie seals are easily seen, there is, of course, no 

 special difficulty, and mistakes are seldom made; not so iu the drives, liowever. 



During a small drive at Glinka, Copper Island, August 8, IS!)."), about 300 seals 

 were made to cross the mountain pass (about 800 feet) in three main divisions, no less 

 than 30 grown men taking x)art in the driving. Halfway ui> one of the men declared 

 that there was a "matka"' in the drive. It was questioned, but uixui closer scrutiny 

 he was found to be right. It was not until tlie final sorting before the killing took 

 place that several females were discovered in the flock. 



As an additional indication of the lack of definition of the ditt'erent classes of 

 seals as expressed in their sizes, I append a few tables of measurements taken from 

 the freshly killed animals. 



'The number of animals and tlie proportion of the sexes on North Kookerv, Hernia Island, 

 ■luring .Inly, 1893. as quoted by Dr. Slunin (Promysl. Hof;. Kani. Sakh. Koniand.. p. '.>), from the oliicial 

 journal of the overseer {ul)itsiitlni ilntriiik iiathirattlia) are worse than useless. The ntimeration by the 

 overseer in question is the worst kind of ftiiesswork, if not entirely fictitious. Dr. Sliiiiin's remark 

 that the conclusions to be made from those figures would be strange (atramii) is certainly appropriate. 



r. C. B. 1896—5 



