54 FUR-SEAL HEED OF ALASKA. 



wash and feed and is not back on this allotted space one-half of the time again during 

 the season. In this way is it not clear that the females almost double their number 

 on the rookery grounds without causing the expansion of the same beyond the limits 

 that would be actually required did they not bear any young at all? For every 

 100,000 breeding seals there will be found more than 85,000 females and less than 

 15,000 males; and in a few weeks after the landing of these females they will show 

 for themselves— that is. for this 100.000— fully 180,000 males, females, and young, 

 instead, on the same area of ground occupied previously to the birth of the pups. 



" It must be borne in mind that perhaps 10 or 12 per cent of the entire number of 

 females were yearlings last season and come up onto these breeding grounds as nubiles 

 for the first time during the season — as 2-year-old cows. They, of course, bear no 

 young. The males, being treble and quadruple the physical bulk of the females, 

 require about 4 feet square for their use of this same rookery ground, but as they are 

 less than one-fifteenth the number of the females — much less, in fact — they there- 

 fore occupy only one-eighth of the space over the breeding ground, where we have- 

 located the supposed 100,000. This surplus area of the males is also more than bal- 

 anced and equalized by the 15,000 or 20,000 2-year-old females which come onto this 

 ground for the first time to meet the males. They come, rest a few days or a week, 

 and retire, leaving no young to show their presence on the ground. 



"The breeding bulls average 10 feet apart by 7 feet on the rookery ground; have 

 each a space, therefore, of about 70 square feet for an average family of 15 cows, 15 

 pups, and 5 virgin females, or 35 animals for the 70 feet — 2 square feet for each seal, 

 big or little. The virgin females do not lay out long, and the cows come and go at 

 intervals, never all being on this ground at one time, so the bull has plenty of room 

 in his space of 70 square feet for himself and harem. 



"Taking all these points into consideration, and they are features of fact, I quite 

 safely calculate upon an average of 2 square feet to every animal, big or little, on the 

 breeding grounds at the initiat point upon which to base an intelligent computation 

 of the entire number of seals before us. Without following this system of enumeration 

 a person may look over these swarming myriads between Southwest Point and Novas- 

 toshnah, guessing vaguely and wildly at any figure from 1,000,000 up to 10,000,000 

 or 12,000,000, as has been done repeatedly. How few people know what a million 

 really is! It is very easy to talk of a million, but it is a tedious task to count it off, 

 and makes one's statements as to ' millions' decidedly more conservative after the labor 

 has been accomplished." (Transcript from the author's field notes of 1874. Nah 

 Speelkie, St. Paul Island, July 12.) 



I am satisfied to-day that the pups are the sure guide to the whole number of seals 

 on the rookeries. The mother seals are constantly coming and going, while the pups 

 never leave the spot upon which they are dropped more than a few feet in any du-ec- 

 tion until the rutting season ends; then they are allowed, with their mothers, by the 

 old bulls to scatter over all the ground they want to. At this date the compact system 

 of organization and massing on the breeding grounds is solidly maintained by the 

 bulls; it is not relaxed in the least until on and after July 20. 



CENSUS OF POLAVINA ROOKERY. 



[Field notes to accompany the chart and survey of condition of Polavina (proper) rookery, St. Paul Island, 

 Prilnlof ( iroup, July 15," 1913, by Henry W. Elliott and A. F. Gallagher, special agents,"House Committee 

 on Expenditures iii the Department of Commerce. 



(The condition of the rookery, when comparison is made with that 

 of 1890, is founded upon the pubHshed ofhcial survey made by 

 Henry W. Elhott and Charles J. Goff, July 10, 1890, and duly pub- 

 Hshed as House Document 175, Fifty-fourth Congress, First Session, 

 pages 31, 32, 33.) 



Before we reach station F, of the 1890 survey, we find two harems 

 located under the bluffs of the hauling grounds of 1890, on the grand 

 parade. There are 14 cows and 2 bulls in these harems, being all 

 the life there. 



We proceed along from that station, toward jag 4, at the base of 

 which we find one full harem — -a bull with about 80 cows; 1 bull 

 with 7 cows, and 1 bull with 1 cow, with no "polsecatchie," and no 

 idle bulls in sight. 



