FUIl-SEAL INOUSTEY OF THE COMMANDER ISLANDS 
307 
No measure short of total stoppage of pelagic sealing could have prevented the 
final destruction of the seal herd, though, of course, the excessive scraping of the 
rookeries for naale seals and the tragic killing of females toM^ard the end of his 
administration and against his protest naturally hastened the process. 
Col. Nikolai Pavlovitch Sokolnikof, who for 10 years had been administrator of 
the Anadyr district, was transferred to the Commander Islands after the death uf 
Grebnitski. Upon his arrival iu 1907, finding that the killing of cows was practiced 
upon the initiative and responsibilit}^ of the assistant manager, he put a stop to it 
that same fall and protested earnestly against it to the department in St. Petersburg 
without avail. The department issued a permit for 1909 to kill 4,000 cows and 
1,500 bachelors, and in order to make sure that this maximum should be reached 
the leasing company agreed to accept up to 20 per cent of stagy skins. However, 
not more than 3,155 cows were secured, though the total quota was exceeded by 
311 skins. 
. When this document was discovered in the archives of Bering Island in 1922, 
we knew already that cows had been killed quite extensively, but were so amazed 
to see this unblushing Governmental acknowledgment that a photograph of the 
"Viedo5np3t" (herewith reprotluced as fig. 14) was taken as a memento and as 
proof. The work begun in 1909 was continued in 1910, only there were fewer seals 
to take. The result on both islands was as follows: 
Sealskins taken on Commander Islands, season of 1910 
Island 
Bachelors 
Cows 
Total 
Bering Island 
206 
502 
1, 105 
1,492 
1,311 
1,994 
Copper Island 
Total 
708 
2,597 
3, 305 
In order to obtain this number it was necessary to extend the killing season 
to August 31 on Copper Island and to October 2 on Bering Island. In fact, of the 
3,305 skins taken only 863 were secured before August 1, on which date, in the past, 
killing usually stopped. Finally, in the years 1907 to 1909 over 2,500 gray pups 
were killed in the fall for food for the natives. Just exactly what was the propor- 
tion of the sexes among these is not known, but certainly they were not all males. 
The alarming reports about the condition of the rookeries, the approaching 
expiration of the lease of the Kamchatka company, and the proposed negotiations 
for a treaty to abolish pelagic sealing induced the Ministry of Agriculture and 
Public Domain to make an investigation in order to obtain information at first 
hand. Evgenij K. Suvorof, who was sent from St. Petersburg in 1910, does not 
seem to have had any previous experience with the fur-seal industrj?^ or the fur seals. 
This, however, was not of much significance, for all he could do was to confirm 
the utter demoralization of the whole business. It was only when he attempted to 
explain certain features of the debacle and its causes, and also when he attempted 
to make an estimate or a "count" of the number of seals remaining and the classes 
of seals composing the herd, a feature which will be referred to later, that his inexperi- 
