THREATENED EXTERMINATION OF THE FUR SEAL. 



THE fur-seal herds of the north 

 Pacific breed on islands situated 

 in Bering Sea and belonging to 

 the United States and Russia. 

 On these islands, Pribilof and Koman- 

 dorski, for nearly a hundred years 

 they have received all necessary pro 

 tection from attacks on land. The ex 

 istence of the herds, however, demands 

 the further protection of the females 

 when they are feeding or migrating in 

 the open sea beyond the usual three- 

 mile limit of territorial jurisdiction. 

 The animals visit certain islands in the 

 summer. They breed on them and 

 make them their home. The young 

 remain there until driven away by the 

 storms of winter. The adults leave the 

 islands in summer only to feed, going 

 to a distance of one hundred to two 

 hundred miles for that purpose. The 

 winter is spent by the entire herd in 

 the open sea, their migrations extend 

 ing from one thousand to twenty-five 

 hundred miles to the southward of 

 their breeding-resorts. 



For many years, both under Russian 

 and American control, the herds have, 

 as I have said, received absolute pro 

 tection on land, the killing for skins 

 being restricted to the bands of super 

 fluous males. As only one male in 

 about thirty is able to maintain himself 

 on a rookery or to rear a family, about 

 twenty-nine out of every thirty are 

 necessarily superfluous. The survival 

 of one male in a hundred is sufficient 

 for all actual needs of propagation. 

 The young males on land are as easily 

 handled and selected as sheep, and no 

 diminution whatever to the increase of 

 the herd has arisen from selective land- 

 killing. The number of females in the 

 herd bearing young each year was, in 

 the earlier days, about 650,000 on the 

 American islands and perhaps half as 

 many on the Russian. The numbers of 

 males and of young were together 

 about twice as many more. This gave 

 an annual total on the American, or 

 Pribilof, islands of about 2,000,000 ani 



mals of all classes, while on the Rus 

 sian, or Komandorski, islands there 

 were about 1,000,000. 



About 1884 different persons, known 

 as pelagic sealers chiefly citizens of 

 Canada, but some of them from the 

 United States began to attack the 

 herd in Bering Sea. Here no selective 

 killing was possible. The females were 

 always in the numerical majority, as 

 the males had become less numerous 

 on account of land-killing and as they 

 left the islands less frequently in the 

 summer. Each female above two years, 

 when taken in the sea, died with her 

 unborn young. Most of the adult fe 

 males so taken after July I had left 

 their young on the islands, and these 

 orphan pups invariably starved to 

 death. 



Beginning with this increase of pe 

 lagic sealing in 1884 the fur-seal herds 

 rapidly declined in numbers. In 1897 

 there were about 130,000 breeding-seals 

 on the American islands, or about 400,- 

 000 animals of all classes, while on the 

 Russian islands there were less than 

 65,000 breeding-animals, or less than 

 200,000 of all classes. 



For this great reduction in numbers 

 there is but one cause a cause plain, 

 self-evident, and undeniable and that 

 is the slaughter of breeding-females at 

 a rate largely in excess of the rate of 

 increase. While other causes have been 

 assigned, none of them is worthy of the 

 slightest consideration in explaining 

 the decline. 



Even in 1893 it was evident, to all 

 capable of forming an opinion, that 

 pelagic sealing was the sole known 

 cause of the decline of the fur-seal 

 herds. It was also evident that as an 

 industry it must be self-destructive, 

 since, if permitted to exist on any 

 scale which would make it profitable, 

 it must destroy the herd on which it 

 operated. "Lessons of the Paris Tribunal 

 of Arbitration" by President David Starr 

 Jordan, in Forum, 



181 



