514 INVESTIGATION OF THE FUR-SEAL INDUSTRY OF ALASKA. 



The Chairman. My impression was that 1,800 were taken in the 

 fall of 1912 and 400 skins were taken in 1913, when you were up there. 



Mr. Clark. I have stated here that I did not see them killed. The 

 400 skins you refer to I believe were taken at a killing on July 7, 

 before I landed on the islands. 



The Chairman. That is the way the proposition stands. One 

 thousand eight hundred were taken in the fall before, and the other 

 400 were taken before you went to the island last summer ? 



Mr. Clark. I do not know as to that. I think more of them were 

 killed early in June. I think that other killings were made before 

 July 7. 



Mr. McGuire. Were 400 skins all that were taken in 1913? 



Mr. Elliott. No; they were taken before we left. 



Mr. Clark. They could not take any after we left. 



Mr. McGuire. You do not know how many were taken for commer- 

 cial purposes and for food purposes in 1913? 



Mr. Clark. I know it was stated that there were 2,400 skins on 

 board the ship coming down, and they were necessarily food skins; 

 they were all food skins last year, and they were necessarily taken in 

 the fall of 1912 or spring of 1913. 



Mr. McGuire. In your judgment, that was 10,000 short of what it 

 ought to have been? 



Mr. Clark. Yes. 



Mr. McGuire. What, in your judgment, would be an economical 

 and proper killing of the Government on the islands for food purposes 

 alone to feed 300 natives ? 



Mr. Clark. A fur seal dresses about 25 pounds of meat. There 

 are 300 people on the islands, and 5,000 fur-seal carcasses would allow 

 a little over 1 pound of meat a day to each of the natives. The 

 natives in that country are, of course, heavy meat eaters, and there- 

 fore 1 pound of meat a day would be nothing but a taste for them. I 

 fixed, in my recommendation to the department, 5,000 as the min- 

 imum that could be taken as an interpretation of a food killing. Then 

 I called attention to the modus vivendi provision in which Great 

 Britain agreed that 7,500 was a normal killing for food for the same 

 population. I believe that 7,500 seals should have been taken for 

 the food of the natives. 



Mr. McGuire. Assume that 10,000 seals should have been taken 

 last year that were not taken. If that had been done, could the na- 

 tives have utilized the meat as food ? 



Mr. Clark. I think they could. 



Mr. McGuire. And } t ou say we are now buying canned meats and 

 sending them up there ? 



Mr. Clark. Yes. 



Mr. McGuire. That is an expense which would have been saved 

 had we killed the 10,000? 



Mr. Clark. Yes. 



Mr. McGuire. I understood you to say that the foxes were dimin- 

 ishing because the}' were starving. If we had killed the 10,000 seals, 

 could that meat have been utilized to feed the foxes and sustain a 

 greater number of foxes than what we have now? 



Mr. Clark. Yes. sir. 



(Thereupon, at 4 o'clock p. m., the committee adjourned to meet 

 at 10.30 o'clock a. m. Monday, Feb. 23, 1914.) 



