EXPERIMENTS IN CULLING AND HERDING THE SEALS. 461 



a V-shaped exteusion of tbe chute and each one constituted an opening as great as 

 the width of the passage itself. Tiie design was to open the gates alternately, letting 

 out kilhible seals at one side and iionlvillable ones at the other. 



The seals were driven up to the chute in pods of 40 to 50, as they would be at a 

 killing. At tirst they were allowed to pass through with both gates oi^en in order to 

 determine whether they would pass through. They did this fairly well. Occasionally 

 there was difficulty arising from the tendency of the leader to turn about on coming 

 close to the frame of the gates, stopping up the way and causing the seals to pile one 

 on aiu)ther. The post dividing one gateway from the other proved an insuperable 

 obstacle to the animals, many of them running their noses into it point blank. 



One gateway was then closed and the seals allowed to pass out of one side only. 

 When a break occurred in the line of seals the gates were reversed. This made no 

 difference to the seals; they would go out of either side readily enough. But the 

 difficulty arose when it was necessary to reverse the gates at close range. When the 

 leading seal started, all the others rushed after pell mell, making it impossible to shut 

 the gate when once the line started through. 



This tendency on the part of the seal not to go at all until he feels like it and 

 then to go in a mad rush, soon demonstrated the impossibility of ever culling the 

 killable from the nonkillable seals in this way. With more linely adjusted machinery 

 better success might be had. The present apparatus is crude, but it seems sufficient 

 to demonstrate the imprat^tieability of the plan. 



The seals are stupid, awkward, and withal dangerous beasts to handle at short 

 range. They bunch together and try and see how many deep they can pile on one 

 another. When one on the outside decides to start in any direction, the whole lot 

 follows in a mass. The i)resent way of culling out the killables by knocking them 

 down and allowing those with which they are mixed to escape seems to be the best 

 method of handling them. 



The seals operated upon this morning were for the most part old bulls and half 

 bulls, with occasional holostiaki mixed in. These animals are much more easily 

 managed than the little fellows, the yearlings and 2year-olds, as the former are 

 somewhat afraid of eacii other. 



HERDING IN THE LAGOON. 



The seals on being released iVom the chute were then turned in the Lagoon, in 

 order to experiment with the idea of herding up rejected seals so that they need not 

 again appear on the hauling grounds until after the season is over. 



The Lagoon is a body of salt water containing about 300 acres of space. It is cut 

 off from the sea, except for a narrow channel, by a rocky spit. Having direct 

 connection with the sea it therefore seems likely that the bachelor seals could be kept 

 there during the month of July without any inconvenience to them. The Lagoon is 

 easily accessible for the Reef, Gorbatch, Lukanin, Kitovi, Tolstoi, and Zapadni 

 rookeries. It would not be a very long or hard drive to bring to it the seals from 

 Polovlua, and judging from the appearance that 3,000 seals make the place might 

 easily contain 50,000. 



After the killings on the respective grounds of these rookeries the rejected seals 

 might be rounded up and driven very carefully and slowly to the Lagoon and kept 

 there until the season for killing was over. This closes about July 25. They could 



