20 FUE-SEAL HEED OF ALASKA. 



The estimates of loss ^ which the Bureau of Fisheries put upon the 

 kilhng of females bv the pelagic hunters are excessive; true when 

 the adult primipara (female) is killed heavy with young, but not 

 when the nubile is slaughtered. That makes their charge of "three 

 seals is lost to the herd for every female taken," excessive. But, 

 nevertheless, since they have annually repeated this charge against 

 the kilhng of the pelagic sealer since 1890 to date of the sealing 

 treaty now in effect, December 15, 1911, the effect of their making 

 this heavy loss so specific should have been enough to warrant a 

 large deduction from their annual "paper census" that "accurate 

 and careful counting" of the herd which is set forth to the commit- 

 tee in the following dogmatic words: 



[Hearing No. 9, p. 367, House Committee on Expenditures in the Department of Commerce and Labor.) 



Mr. Lembkey. Many erroneous statements have been made to this committee and 

 to the Committee on Conservation of National Resovirces in the Senate as to the 

 number of seals which now compose the herd. 



In view of this confusion of data with which the committee has had to_ contend, 

 it may be well to give to it at once a detailed statement of the censtis of seal life on the 

 Pribilof Islands as taken at the close of the last season, 1911: 



Bulls, active (with cows) 1, 356 



Bulls, adult, but idle (without cows) 329 



Half bulls (from 4 to 6 years) 2, 222 



Bachelors, 3-year-olds 1, 200 



Bachelors, 2-year-olds 2, 897 



Bachelors, 1-vear-olds 15, 322 



Male pups...'. 19,700 



Breeding females 39, 400 



2-year-old females 10, 297 



Yearling females 15, 322 



Female pups 19, 700 



Total 127, 745 



1 This great loss annually, never noted or eomited by the scientific census takers of the Pribilof herd, 

 from 1904 to 1912. 



Aside from the great loss in seals which are shot and not recoverable it must be remembered that nearly 

 80 per cent of all seals taken in Bering Sea are preenant females having nursing pups ashore, which die of 

 starvation after the loss of the mother. The death of each pregnant female, therefore, means the loss of three 

 lives to the herd, in addition to the great waste incident to the nonrecovery of seals shot in the water, which 

 has just been referred to. 



In view of the facts just mentioned, it may fairly be believed that the catch of 27,216 skins by the pelagic 

 fleets in 1907 represents a loss to the herd of upwara of 75,000 animals. They show that to secure 27,000 

 skins on land only that number of animals need be killed, and the surplus" males which can be spared 

 without injury, while to secure 27,000 skins in the water practically 75,000 animals must be slaughtered. 

 Stronger proof of the destnictiveness of this practice and of the certainly and rapidity with which it re- 

 duces the herd can not be given. (Amiiial Report Seal Fisheries of Alaska, 1906. By W. I. Lembkey, 

 agent in charge ol Alaskan seal fisheries. Department of Commerce and Labor, Division of Alaskan Fish- 

 eries, Washington, Dee. 14, 1906. P. 279, Appendix A, June 24, 1911. House Committee on Expenditures 

 in the Department of Commerce and Labor.) 



With regard to this matter of the number of tur seals in existence during 1872-1874, which Dr. Jordan 

 has asserted never exceeded two and a half millions (2.509,000). and about which he knew absolutely noth- 

 ing (and after a few weeks of experience spent on the islands), it is interesting to note the opinion of W. I. 

 Lembkey. who has passed every season on the rookeries of St. Paul Island since 1899 to the end of the .sea- 

 son of 1913, or 14 breeding summers (and three winters also of this period), to wit: 



He testified before the Ways and Means Committee of the House of Representatives, Jan. 25, 1907, as 

 follows (p. 66, MS. Notes of Hearing): 



"Mr. Lembkey. In 1870con.servative estimates placed the number on the Pribilof Islands between four 

 and five millions; to-day there are probably not over 180,000 seals in the entire herd. 



"Mr. Williams. At the end of 18 or 19 years, if no killing at all, you think they would cro back to between 

 four and five millions? 



" Mr. Lembkey. I have no doubt thev would." 



Contrast the above opinion of Lembkey (who indorses the Elliott figures) with that of Jordan below, who , 

 in 1897, after insisting that there were onlv :^76.000 seals of all classes alive then in the Pribilof herd, had 

 the following to say of the Elliott figures of 4,700,000 seals in 1872-1874 and 1 .020.000 in 1890: 



12. "To sum up the whole matter, we are unable to accept Mr. Elliott's estimate as representing anything 

 more than an individual opinion greatly overdra\Mi by a too vivid imagination. 



"In making the above criticisms of Mr. Elliott's census, it has not been our purpose to tear down and 

 condemn work which in many respects under the circimistances deserves commendation; but a dispo- 

 sition has oi late been manifested to insist upon the absolute correctness of these figures, and in setting 

 them aside it becomes necessary for us to give reasons for such action." 



13. Elliott's estimate of 1890 "is as bad,' if not worse, than the first." "It is not possible to suggest any 

 any explanation or justification for the vagaries which these estimates of Mr. Elliott show. 



