70 MANAGEMENT. 



Reasons for his They killed mostly all the product of 1866-67- 



report. . n 



In making our calculations for breeding seals we 

 did not take that loss into consideration, so that 

 in 1872-73, when the crop of 1866-67 would 

 have matured, we were a little short. These 

 seals had been killed. For that reason, to ren- 

 der the matter doubly sure, I recommended to the 

 Secretary a diminution of 15,000 seals for the 

 ten years ensuing: I do not, however, wish to 

 be understood as saying that the seals are all 

 decreasing — that the proportionate number of 

 male seals of the proper age to take is decreasing. 



"Q. The females are increasing? 



"A. Yes, sir; and consequently the number 

 of pups produced annually." 1 



In 1872 the seals taken were principally four 

 and six years old and some of seven years old 

 were killed (Sec. 812). This was drawing from 

 the same class of seals killed in 1868, 2 which 

 would, had they been spared, have appeared on 

 the rookeries as breeders in 1873 and the years 

 thereafter. 



The following year (1873) the class of skins 

 preferred were " three-year-olds" (Sec. 813), or 

 those born in 1870; the so-called "crops" of 

 1869 and 1870 would not have been fit to go on 



« Ho. Rep., 44th Cong., 1st Sess., Rept. No. 623, p. 99. 

 2 Appendix to Case of the United States, Vol. II, p. 7. 



