512 INVESTIGATION OF THE FUR-SEAL INDUSTRY OF ALASKA. 



Mr. McGuire. So that there is not any sexual development the 

 first year, either on the part of the male or the female ? 



Mr. Clark. No, I should not say so. 



Mr. McGuire. Is that your experience, that the females do not 

 go to the breeding grounds until they are 2 years old ? 



Mr. Clark. That is right. 



Mr McGuire. That has been settled? 



Mr. Clark. Yes; that has been settled. 



Mr. McGuire. So there are no yearling females which go to the 

 breeding grounds ? 



Mr. Clark. If they go, they go like the pups. They are immature 

 and the bulls pay no attention to them, and the cows only snap at 

 them and drive them away. 



Mr. McGuire. If you are accurate in your conclusion that the 

 pups do not return, there are very few of either the females or the 

 males that return until late in the season ? 



Mr. Clark. That is what I mean when I speak about their being 

 among the pups and females after the killing season. 



Mr. McGuire. And after the breeding season? 



Mr. Clark. Yes, and after the breeding season. The mothers and 

 pups remain on the rookeries, without harem organization, all 

 through the fall. The rookeries retain a semblance of their char- 

 acter. 



Mr. McGuire. Have the bulls gone ? 



Mr. Clark. The bulls have gone except for a few who come back 

 and loiter around from force of habit. 



Mr. McGuire. Those are the inactive bulls ? 



Mr. Clark. Yes; some of the bulls are always on the rookeries, 

 but the majority of them are resting in the sand hills. There is no 

 fight left in them, and there is no trouble with them at all, and they 

 have a good time for the rest of the season. 



The Chairman. I believe the bulls stay there without eating or 

 drinking for a long time? 



Mr. Clark. Yes; they do not eat or drink from the first arrival in 

 May until their departure about the 1st of August. 



I would say that nature makes a definite provision for that, because 

 the bull is lined up with fat. inches deep under his skin, and he lives 

 on that fat. When the bull leaves the rookery the 1st of August 

 he is thin and lean as a rail. His skin is loose and he is hungry and 

 lean. 



Mr. McGuire. Xow. I understood from your written statement to 

 this Committee that you, as an expert, do not agree with the action 

 of Congress in closing the season % 



Mr. Clark. I most emphatically disagree with that; yes. 



Mr. McGuire. Have you any figures which represent your con- 

 clusions with respect to the loss to the Government, we will say, 

 from the time we began the closed season up to 1915, up to and 

 including 1915 \ 



Mr. Clark. I have estimated that there were 10,000 3-vear old 

 seals on the hauling grounds this year, that under a commercial 

 killing would have been killed for then skins. That is a positive 

 loss. I am unable to state definitely what would have been the 

 quota in 1912 if it had been allowed. No quota was killed in 1912, 

 but I think that because 2-year olds were killed in 1911, possibly not 



