66 R. BROWN ON THE SEALS OF GREENLAND. 



deeper hue of the same colour 



The majority of the " Bladdernoses " which I have seen were about 

 two or three years old, and were apparently, by a slow and gradual 

 change, becoming similar to the old and mature Seals, by turning 

 darker and darker in their colours, and assuming the roundish oval 

 markings, while at the same time they were increasing in size. 

 This species seems to produce its young earlier than P. grcenlan- 

 dicus. 



Geographical Distribution and Migrations. — The Bladdernose 

 is found all over the Greenland seas, from Iceland to Greenland 

 and Spitzbergen, but chiefly in the more southern parts. The 

 first Seals which we saw and killed on making the ice early 

 in March 1861, were chiefly young "Bladders" which had not 

 yet got the hood-like appendage. It even finds its way to the 

 temperate shores of Europe and America, and rare stragglers now 

 and then land on the shores of Britain, though it is by no means 

 a member of our fauna proper. This Seal is not common any- 

 where. On the shores of Greenland it is chiefly found beside 

 large fields of ice, and comes to the coast, as was remarked by 

 Fabricius long ago, at certain times of the year. They are chiefly 

 found in South Greenland, though it is erroneous to say that they 

 are exclusively confined to that section. I have seen them not un- 

 commonly about Disco Bay, and have killed them in Melville Bay, 

 in the most northerly portion of Baffin's Bay. They are princi- 

 pally killed in the district of Julianshaab, and then almost solely 

 in the most southern part, on the outermost islands, from about 

 the 20th of May to the last of June ; but in this short time they 

 supply a great portion of the food of the natives and form a third 

 of the colony's yearly production. In the beginning of July the 

 Klapmyds leaves, but returns in August, when it is much emaciated. 

 Then begins what the Danes in Greenland call the maigre Klap- 

 mydse fangst, or the '* lean-Klapmyds-catching," which lasts from 

 three to four weeks. Very seldom is a Klapmyds to be got at other 

 places, and especially at other times. The natives call a Klapmyds 

 found single up a fjord by the name of Nerimartont^ the meaning 

 of which is " gone after food." They regularly frequent some small 

 islands not far from Julianshaab, when a good number are caught. 

 After this they go further north, but are lost sight of, and it is 

 not known where they go to (Rink, /. c). Those seen in North 

 Greenland are mere stragglers, wandering from the herd, and are 

 not a continuation of the migrating flocks. Johannes (a very 

 knowing man of Jakobshavn) informed me that generally about 

 the 12th of July a few are killed in Jakobshavn Bay (lat. 69° 

 13^ N.) It is more pelagic in its habits than the other Seals, with 

 the exception of the Saddleback. 



Economic Value and Hunt.—ThQ Klapmyds yields, on the 

 average, half a cask of blubber, and the dried meat of every 

 Seal weighs about 24 Danish lbs. ; but this is not the whole 

 Seal, which weighs about 200 lbs. The yearly catch in Green- 

 land (Danish) is about 2,000 or 3,000 (Kink, /. c). 



