THE SWIMMING PUPS. 69 
When it is about a month old the pup seeks the water’s edge, and after paddling 
about for a time in the tide pools gradually learns to swim. This art, in which it 
becomes wonderfully expert, it finds evident difficulty in acquiring. 
THE SWIMMING OF THE PUPS. 
Many accounts have been given of the way in which various classes of animals are 
supposed to assist the pups in learning to swim. If these have any foundation 
whatever it arises from a misinterpretation of the fact that the young bachelors, and 
probably the yearling cows as well, play with and tease the pups in their first 
attempts to swim. Bachelors were thus often seen to shove the little pups off the 
rocks into the water, or even to attempt to catch and duck them. But the purpose 
was not to assist the pups. 
What first starts the pup to the water is not clear, though why any other reason 
than the mere fact that it must eventually learn to swim and. that the water is at 
hand, should be necessary, is not clear. It. may be that the first pups seek the water 
following the example of the departing cows. But, once a.single pup has made the 
experiment, every pup in its section of the rookery soon follows the example. ° 
The pup seeks first the secluded and protected tide pools, of which numbers can’ 
be found along the rookery fronts. Here it paddles about, gradually seeking the open 
water, but keeping close to the shore. lts chief difficulty at the outset is to keep its 
disproportionately large head above water. In a very short time it becomes perfectly 
at home io the water and spends most of the daytime in it. As the pups are accus- 
tomed to play on shore, so they play in the water, rolling over and over each other, 
diving for shells, shaking strips of kelp, pieces of sticks, feathers, or anything that 
comes to hand, just as young dogs might. 
THE EXCURSIONS OF THE PUPS. 
By the middle of September, when the pups have learned to swim well, they sud- 
denly develop a roving spirit and pass back and forth between neighboring rookeries, 
and there is a continuous band of pups coming and going between them. Thus, such 
a belt of pups was found in the early part of September to extend from Kitovi rookery 
past East Landing to Reef rookery, nearly a mile distant. Another followed around 
the cliffs back of the village connecting Gorbatch with Lagoon. Lagoon was in like 
manner connected with Tolstoi head, and a band of pups stretched on along the water 
front of English Bay, uniting Tolstoi and the Zapadnis. 
At certain points intermediate between these terminals, the pups hauled out in 
groups of varying sizes and slept on the rocks, apparently remaining there for days 
and days at atime. But after the. pups were branded on Kitovi rookery, observa- 
tions on a pod of these pups hauled out under Black Bluff showed that while the 
number in these distant places remained nearly constant, the individuals came and 
went regularly. The pups doubtless returned to the rookery to meet their mothers, 
timing their visits with her return. 
Toward the close of the month of September these excursions of the pups ceased 
‘as suddenly as they began, and the pups remained about their respective rookeries 
and in the waters adjacent to them, sleeping: on shore-when hungry, sleeping and 
playing in the water when full of milk. 
