372 TESTIMONY 



I neither saw nor heard, in my twenty years' experience as super- 

 intendent of the sealeries, of any destruction of pups by reason of 

 stampedes of seals. But I have occasionally witnessed the death of 

 pups from being trampled upon by the old bulls during their battles 

 for supremacy. This is, however, of rare occurrence. Even if stam- 

 pedes occurred, the light bodies of the females, averaging only 80 or 00 

 pounds, would pass over a lot of pups without seriously injuring them. 

 Later in the season, after the old males have been superseded on the 

 rookeries by the younger ones, the pups are already able to avoid being 

 inn over, and, as a matter of fact, the death of pups upon the rookeries 

 from any cause whatever prior to the advent of pelagic sealers in Bering 

 Sea was so rare as to occasion no comment. 



It was not customary to drive from any points near enough to the 

 breeding rookeries to cause stampedes, and even if this had been done, 

 I do not think any injury to the rookeries would have been occasioned 

 by it. It might cause some of the cows to move away, but they would 

 soon return again. 

 It is very difficult to determine the average number of females prop- 

 erly assignable to a single male, and difficult even to 

 ascertain how many there are in any given family, be- 

 cause the boundaries of the groups are never well defined, and such as 

 would be said. by one observer to belong to a certain bull would be de- 

 clared by another to be in a different harem. The surface of the ground 

 mainly occupied as breeding rookeries is very irregular. Harems some- 

 times run together. Ledges, bowlders, and lava rocks hinder the uni- 

 form mapping of the family groups, and it is not difficult, therefore, to se- 

 lect certain spots and count a number of female seals which appear to be 

 unattached to any male. On the other hand, there are often found full- 

 grown males upon the rookeries at all seasons with no families, and a 

 still larger number with from one to five females each. Such variations 

 have always occurred. 



With our present knowledge of seal life, it is impossible to judge 

 with any degree of accuracy how many females may safely be referred 

 to a single male. But, by analogy, it is a very much larger number 

 than has frequently been named as a fair average. Horse-breeders re- 

 gard a healthy stallion as capable of serving from forty to fifty mares 

 in a single season; cattle-breeders apportion at least forty cows to a 

 bull, and sheep-raisers regard from thirty to forty ewes as not too 

 many for a single ram, and in the latter case, at least, the season of 

 service is no longer than that permitted to the male seal. I think it 

 would be safe to place an average of forty to fifty seals to a harem as 

 not excessive. 



It is not unusual during the early years of the Alaska Commercial 

 Company's lease to find exceptionally large harems containing from 

 fifty to a hundred females each, but we saw no reason to doubt that 

 they were fully served by the male. 

 The erroneous idea seems to have gained lodgment that during the 

 first decade of the lease a reserve of breeding seals was 

 Extension of driv- kept on certain rookeries, and that towards the end of 

 this decade it became necessary to draw on these rook- 

 eries because killing 100,000 seals per annum had been too much of a drain 

 upon the herd. This has no foundation in fact. In the early years 

 of the lease the transportation facilities upon the islands, both by land 

 and water, were very limited, and, as the Government agent in charge 

 (Captain Bryant) did not object, we consulted our convenience and 

 drove more frequently from near-by rookeries, but at all times worked 



