ALASKA INDUSTRIES. 139 



Both the Copper Island skins and the Alaska skins are almost exclu- 

 sively the skins of the male seals, and the difference between the skin 

 of a male seal and a female seal of adult age can be as readily seen as 

 between the skins of different sexes of other animals. That the North- 

 west skins are, in turn distinguishable from the Copper Island and 

 Alaska skins, first by reason of the fact that a very large proportion 

 of the adult skins are obviously the skins of female animals; second, 

 because they are all pierced with a spear or harpoon or shot, in conse- 



Juence of being killed in open sea, and not, as in the case of Copper 

 sland and Alaska skins, being killed upon land by clubs; third, 

 because the Northwest skins are cured upon vessels by the crews of 

 whicli they are killed, upon which there are not the same facilities for 

 flaying or salting the skins as there are upon land, where the Copper 

 and Alaska skins are flayed and salted. The Japanese skins, which, 1 

 think, are now included in the Northwest catch, are distinguishable 

 from the other skins of the Northwest catch by being yellower in color, 

 having a much shorter pile, because they are salted with fine salt, and 

 have plenty of blubber on the pelt. That the skins purchased by 

 deponent's firm are handed over by it to what are called dressers and 

 dyers, for the purpose of being dressed and dyed. (Henry Poland.) 



That the differences in the skins of the adult male and the adult 

 female seals are as marked as the difference between the skins of the 

 two sexes of the other animals, and that in the Northwest catch from 

 85 to 90 per cent of the skins are of the female animal. Deponent 

 does not mean to state that these figures are mathematically accurate, 

 but they are, in his judgment, approximately exact. (Geo. Rice.) 



I should estimate the proportion of female skins included within the 

 Northwest catch at at least 75 per cent, and I should not be surprised 

 at, nor be inclined to contradict, an estimate of upward of 90 per cent. 

 My sorter, who actually handles the skins, estimates the number of 

 female skins in the Northwest catch at 90 per cent. One means of dis- 

 tinguishing the skins of the Northwest catch from those of the other 

 catches is the fact that they are pierced with shot or spear holes, having 

 been killed in the open sea, and not, as in the case of the Copper and 

 Alaska catches, killed upon land with clubs. (William C. B. Stamp.) 



The number of Japanese skins averages, deponent should say, about 

 6,000 a year, although there is a good deal of fluctuation in the quantity 

 from year to year, and deponent says that, like the other skins included 

 in the Northwest catch, they are principally the skins of female seals, 

 not easily distinguishable from the skins taken from the herds frequent- 

 ing the eastern part of the Pacific Ocean and Bering Sea, except by 

 reason of their being principally speared instead of shot. The most 

 essential difference between the Northwest skins and the Alaska and 

 Copper catches is that the Northwest skins, so far as they are skins of 

 adult seals, are almost exclusively the skirts of female seals, and are 

 nearly always pierced with shot, bullet, or spear holes. The skins of 

 the adult female seals may be as readily distinguishable from the skins 

 of the adult male as the skins of the different sexes of other animals; 

 that practically the whole of the adult North west- catch seals were the 

 skins of female seals, but the skins of the younger animals included 

 within this Northwest catch, of which we have at times considerable 

 numbers, are much more difficult to separate into male and female skins, 

 and I am not prepared to say that I could distinguish the male from 

 the female skins of young animals. A certain percentage of young 



