FUR-SEAL FISHERIES OF ALASKA. 



187 



scraped from seven different points between tlie base of Hutchinson 

 Hill and the southeast extremity of the rookery. 



On the nortliwest shoulder a small pod of say 400 holluschickie were 

 lying in just back of the narrow strip of rookery there, about 250 feet 

 back from the sea. A little way over, across to the south, was another 

 small pod of less than 300, near the small sand beach between the mid- 

 dle and the northwest shoulders. Then another small pod appeared 

 just below the south shoulder, lying above surf wash on the sand, and 

 another small squad lay out on that once famous reach of sand beach 

 under Cross Hill and the Big Lake sand dunes. All told, there could not 

 have been over 3,500 of them. These, plus the 5,000 which Fowler had 

 in hand, gives us all there is on this great rookery to-day — 8,500 hollus- 

 chickie; 95 per cent of them yearlings! 



This hauling in under the cover of the breeding seals by the non- 

 breeding young males, as we see it to-day, recalls forcibly the account 

 whicdi the natives gave to Lieutenant Maynard and myself about the 

 holluschickie as they hauled in in 1835 and several years thereafter. 

 They then "lay in among the breeding seals." 



In 1872, instead of these frequent breaks that now appear in the cir- 

 cuit of this rookery belt here, only one place then existed from Sea 

 Lion Neck clear around to the end of the southwest shoulder. The 

 holluschickie were .then literally obliged to haul out over that sand 

 beach opening in Sea Lion Bight, where there was an open reach of 

 several hundred feet of sea margin, which was avoided by the breeding- 

 seals on account of the sand. To- day, there are twenty-five or thirty 

 vacant spaces in the breeding belt of the Novastoshnah, all open for 

 the holluschickie. 



July 14, 1890. — The following are field notes of the podding and 

 clubbing of a drive made from every section of the Reef peninsula, 

 July 14, 1890: 



Whole number of animals driven, 1,592; number taken, 101, or 93 per 

 cent rejected. Last drive, July 10, when 3,246 animals were driven 

 and 377 taken, or 89 per cent rejected. This drive shoirs the elimination 

 of the 2-year-olds, icMch were first taken here on the 5th instant — now, 

 nearly all yearlings ! 



