8 INVESTIGATION OF THE FUR-SEAL INDUSTRY OF ALASKA. 



located for the first time in the whole history of this herd, the areas 

 of the rookeries and their locations, down to square feet. These red 

 spots [indicating] are the rookeries, or breeding grounds, upon which 

 the old bulls and females breed. Inside of those breeding grounds 

 no young bull under 6 years of age is ever allowed to stay by the 

 old bulls. Therefore, they haul in back and outside of these rook- 

 eries, in between them, and over ground which we call the "hauling 

 grounds. " The space occupied by these breeding seals is much 

 smaller, because they have no regular order of concentration, but 

 move around, and they wipe off every vestige of vegetation from those 

 places of hauling. They occupied about 3,200 acres, while the breed- 

 ing seals only occupied 144 acres in 1872. As I come to speak of the 

 "hauling grounds" and the "rookeries" you will now have a clearer 

 and better understanding of what I mean. There is some confusion 

 in the mind of a person who has never been there, between the non- 

 breeding and the breeding seals, and the " hauling grounds " and the 

 "rookeries." 



It was important that we should get there at the "height of the 

 season," when there would be the greatest number to be seen at any 

 one-time in the year, and that is between the 10th and 20th of July. 

 We arrived there on the 8th of July and looked into every harem 

 on every rookery of the two islands and made as close an estimate and 

 count as any man with common sense could make. Our conclusions 

 are tabulated on page 5 of our report, thus: Breeding bulls, 1,550; 

 cows, 80,000; and pups born, 70,000; total, 151,550. Then came the 

 question of how many nonbreeding seals there were on the 



Mr. W atkins (interposing). Does your report show the compara- 

 tive number now and a few years ago, when you first went there? 



Mr. Elliott. Yes: it is all in detail. Then came this troublesome 

 question of estimating — been use it is impossible to count them, or 

 even see all of them — the nonbreeding seals. The best we could do 

 was to make an estimate based upon what the birth rate of last year 

 must have been of pups, and then allowing 50 per cent loss as the 

 maximum or 30 p< r cent i s the minimum coming back as "yearlings," 

 would have brought 30,000 yearlings; then adding 6,000 2-year-olds, 

 3,000 3-year-olds, and 400 4-year-olds, makes a grand total of bulls, 

 cows, and pups for the sei son of 1913 of 190,950. In 1874 the grand 

 total was 4,700,000; in 1890, when I made my second survey, the 

 grand total was 1,020,000; and this year it is 190,950. 



The Chairman. Can you tell what it was in 1910. when the Gov- 

 ernment commenced to do the business ? 



Mr. Elliott. Well, we had a series of officii: 1 census tables, which 

 declared that in 1910 there were only 137,000, which shows that that 

 was entirely inaccurate. There are 190,000 there this year, and I go 

 into full discussion of that and show why these erroneous tables were 

 sprung upon the committee — namely, that they st irted with Dr. Jor- 

 dan's census of 1896 and 1897, in which he said, at the close of 1897 

 there were only 376,000 seals there, when, in fact, iiiere must have 

 been a million. 



Mr. McGuire. You testified before the committee during the hear- 

 ings and gave an estimate as to the number that there must be there. 

 What was your statement ( 



Mr Elliott. Taking their figures of 1904 as a starter, I said I 

 could form no sensible conclusion, for if their figures were correct 



