330 
BULLETIN OF HIE BUREAU OF FISHERIES 
Experts will know how to value this "count," and the writer calls attention 
merely to the curious proportion of cows and black pups, there being nearly half 
more of the former than of the latter, a feature that characterizes so many of the 
Russian estimates. 
How the estimate of 6,000 seals for Copper Island was arrived at is not known, 
but it was certainly not based upon the periodical count of the rookery guards, 
which for August 16, the same date as the above Bering Island count, gave .tli;^ 
following figures : ;.-,!> an 
Harem bulls tilJaci3i^_. 118 
Bulls without harems , 264 , ;• 
Half bulls 220.-. 
• ^ ..Bachelors 1,381 ,. 
■; "' Cows 2,680 
Black pups 2, 200 
Yearlings ..: : 80 
In the water .uu4i^A!iu«iutij,yo_=^--jLJLi.'»jj%)3f©2>'. <;jBW 
Total a'ios 
Counting the 7,162 seals m the water must be regarded as an astonishing per- 
formance, but docs not inspire great confidence in the accui"acy of the rest of the 
count. However, disregarding these fantastic figures, in view of the status of the 
rookeries as the writer found them in 1922 we have no hesitation in accepting the 
statement that in 1921 there were less than 18,000 seals frequenting the rookeries 
and that there was ample justification for stopping the killing of seals for skiiis,,| 
NUMBER OF SEALS KILLED ON TIIE COMIVIANDER ISLANDS BETWEEN 1917 AMD 1922 
Unfortunately complete official returns as to the number of sldns t.aken. since 
land killing was resumed in 1917 until it was again stopped in 1921 have not been 
available. The writer has seen only Mr. Suvorof's figures for 1917, as given above, 
embracing the killings on both islands, amounting to 810 sldns. In the Bei'ing Island 
archives were found reports of killings on that island only for 1918 and 1919, and with 
regard to these it is not certain that they are complete. For 1920 we know of no 
record except a statement said to have been taken from "A report published by the 
special delegation of the Far Eastern Siberian Republic to the W ashington Conference, 
1922," to the effect that the production of fur-seal skins on the Commander Islands 
during 1920 was 1,000, probably only an approximate figure, which may op may not 
include 813 skins shipped by A. S. Yakum in tiie Admiral Zavoiko in May, 1921, OiS 
the Magnit took 400 skins away from Bering Island on September 9, 1920. On 
Bering Island in 1920 the natives were given permission to kill 100 seals, but 
they killed 400. These were the skins shipped on the Magnit. The Yana,, in October, 
1920, took the skins of 73 half bulls and 6 bachelors, and in Petropaulski we were 
informed that the sailors of the Yana brought "a lot of dried sealskins." It was 
also said that 52 skins were landed there is 1921 from the Kamchaika ■Maru. 
On Bering Island the following killings were made in 1918: July 16, 115 
bachelors, and July 24, 187 bachelors and 1 half bull, a total of 303 skins; and in 
1919: July 3, 107 bachelors, and July 7, 68 bachelors, a total of 175. In 1921, 66 seals 
were killed July 7 on Bering Island for food and leather for the natives, and 32 
seals were killed for the same purposes on Copper Island. . . 
