THE MAMMALS OF THE PRIBILOF ISLANDS. 353 



KILLER WHALE. 



Orca gladiator ( ? ) 



The skull of a killer was brought from St. Taul Island in 1895 by Mr Charles H. 

 Townsend, obtained from a specimen which came ashore to the south of Hutchiasons 

 Hill. Many nominal species of killers have been established, but it has not yet been 

 demonstrated whether there are really several or only one. 



I saw two killers on one occasion quite close inshore at St. Paul in 1895. In 1890 

 Mr. Palmer wrote : "A few seen about the islands in May and early in summer. They 

 return in August. We saw quite a number on August 12 between St. George and 

 Unalaska." 



Most of the natives have seen killers chasing sea lions, and have seen both sea 

 lions and killers strand on the rocky shore. The majority of the killers seen had a 

 large whitish blotch on each side of the back, immediately behind the dorsal. In no 

 case was this blotch pure white, though the center and upper part of it was always 

 lighter than the sides. The tip of the dorsal iu no case turned over. 



HARBOR PORPOISE. 



Phocaina communis Lesson. 



A few bones of a small porpoise, apparently of this species, were picked up at 

 St. Paul June 3, 1890, and twO small schools were seen on the harbor at Unalaska 

 May 20 and 21, the same year. A specimen of this species was obtained by Mr. 

 Charles H. Townsend at Captains Harbor, Unalaska, August 17, 1895. 



The range of several other cetaceans, as given by Scammon, would include the 

 Pribilof Islands. These are the California gray whale, Hhachianeetes glaucus, the 

 humpback, Megaptera versabilis, the right whale, Balwna ^ieboldii (?), and the right 

 whale porpoise, Tursio borealis. As regards the humpback, Scammon remarks r 

 "The last seen of them in high latitudes by whalemen is on their return from the 

 Arctic Ocean, when they are found in the vicinity of St. Paul Island, Bering Sea, in 

 the month of October, aud these are usually very large."' Elliott also cites the 

 Humpback as occurring about the Pribilof Islands, but says there are " a few only.'" 



SPECIES EXTERMINATED. 



6'ea Otter.— Bea otters occurred in great numbers on the Pribilof Islands at the 

 time of their discovery, but were soon extirpated. Elliott states that they were all 

 gone in eight or nine years. I note, however, that Veniaminoff reported them as 

 ''scarce generally in 1811, and in the next thirty years extinct." 



In the report of Treasury Agent Mclntyre in 1875 an account is given of the 

 appearance of the schooner Cygnet off St. George in September, 1874, and the captain 

 is reported as claiming "that he was looking for a kelp patch to the west of the 

 island, where he expected to find otter in abundance.'" How much reliance can be 

 placed on such an intimation is uncertain. 



' Marine Mammalia, 1874, p. 68. 



2 Monograph of the Seal Islands, 1882, p. 125. 



'Seal fisheries of Alaska, House Doc. No. 83, Forty-fourth Congress, first session, 1876, p. 124. 



5947_PT 3 23 



