BUREAU OF FISHERIES 137 



The skins taken are shipped to St. Louis where they are 

 processed for the government by a private concern under 

 contract. Then in the spring and fall of each year public 

 auctions are held, at which time the skins are disposed of 

 to the highest bidders. It is difficult to tell the net income 

 received each year by the United States from the sale of 

 furs taken on the Pribilof Islands, as the books of the 

 bureau are not set up on a yearly basis. For example, dur- 

 ing 1932, $42,247 was paid the natives for their work in 

 taking seal skins, and during that same year the sale of fin- 

 ished skins brought the government $404,460. The skins 

 sold, however, were not those of the 1932 crops but 1930-31 

 and former seasons. No attempt is made apparently to show 

 processing charges, administrative overhead, or cost of the 

 seal patrol maintained jointly by the Coast Guard and the 

 bureau. During 1932, $7,130 was paid natives for taking 

 fox skins and during that year the sales brought $20,000. 

 According to law, sums remaining after payment for pro- 

 cessing skins are covered into the general fund of the 

 Treasury. 46 



The salmon section is under the direction of an Alaskan 

 agent who directs the activities of fourteen vessels and ten 

 wardens, and through them the work of over two hundred 

 temporary employees known as Stream Guards. The latter 

 conduct the patrol on land and water, aided at times by an 

 aerial patrol. Careful observations of the extent of the 

 salmon run during the season and the examination of the 

 spawning grounds at its close enable the agents to determine 

 whether the legal escapement of 50 per cent has been ob- 

 served. These surveys are the means, too, of deciding what 

 changes in the regulation for next season will be necessary. 

 The studies conducted by the Division of Scientific Inquiry 



46 37 Stat. L. 502. 



