116 
ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY BULLETIN 
ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY BULLETIN 
Srpartmrntfi: 
Mammals Aquarium 
W. T. Hornaday. C. H. Townsend. 
Birds Reptiles 
Lee S. Crandall. Raymond L. Ditmars. 
William Beebe. Honorary Curator, Birds 
Published bi-monthly at the Office of the Society, 
111 Broadway, New York City. 
Copy, 25 Cents Yearly, $1.50 
MAILED FREE TO MEMBERS 
Copyright. 1922, oy the New York Zoological Society. 
Sl'BSCRIPTION AND EDITORIAL OFFICES 
ZOOLOGICAL PARK, NEW YORK CITY 
Elwin R. Sanborn, Editor 
Each author is resDonsible for the scientific accuracy and 
the proof reading of his contribution. 
Vol. XXV September, 1922 No. 5 
CARIBOU SLAUGHTER AT FAIRBANKS, 
ALASKA 
Men, Women and Children Enlist, and 
Make War on Ran gif er osborni 
Special dispatch to the New York Evening Post 
Fairbanks, September 5. —Caribou, rabbits, 
geese and bears, which moved down from the 
mountains surrounding this town yesterday were 
mowed down in vast numbers by residents who 
joined in a community hunt. Miss Evelyn 
Houcke, assistant postmaster, was the target of 
a maddened caribou which charged at her auto¬ 
mobile after the girl had fired one shot. Her 
second shot, and also her last cartridge, brought 
down the animal. 
Two hundred automobilists and all the horse- 
drawn vehicles in town carried hunting parties. 
The movie men were out shooting caribou too. 
Even two “Chechako” professors of the new 
Agricultural College of Alaska, which is to open 
September 12, got a caribou apiece. Several 
were killed by school children. 
Old-timers say the invasion of wild animals at 
this season is caused by the approach of winter 
weather. 
Of course it was the annual southern migra¬ 
tion of the herds of Osborn caribou in Alaska 
which rendered the above occurrence possible. 
Usually the line of migration is either eastward 
or westward of Fairbanks, but on this occasion 
the leaders of the herd made a great tactical 
error in steering for the most populous city of 
central Alaska. 
The story as it came off the wire does not read 
well in print, but we must remember that each 
resident of Alaska is entitled to five caribou per 
year and that caribou meat constitutes an im¬ 
portant food factor in the remote territory of 
Alaska. There is really no more reason why the 
assistant postmistress should not bag her caribou 
from the ambush of her automobile the same as 
any other citizen who goes hunting for winter 
meat. 
At present the great caribou herd is in no dan¬ 
ger of being wiped out of existence. There is, 
however, danger that the small and widely scat¬ 
tered bands of caribou that wander into remote 
regions and which, so long as they live, will be 
of immense value to miners and prospectors on 
the far-flung frontier, will be exterminated and 
thereby deprive the most enterprising pioneers 
of a food supply which at present is very valu¬ 
able to them and which for a hundred years to 
come they will sorely need. 
Eastern conservationists who are sincerely in¬ 
terested in the welfare of both the citizens of 
Alaska and the game of Alaska are disposed to 
do their utmost to help preserve the game on a 
continuing basis and to promote its utilization 
from year to year in such a manner that the 
stock will not be annihilated. To this end an 
important game bill prepared by Dr. E. W. Nel¬ 
son, Chief of the Biological Survey, after long 
and careful study and prolonged conferences 
with persons concerned, is now before Congress. 
Although it is a thoroughly good bill, free from 
politics and free from the grinding of personal 
axes, the irreconeilables of Alaska are reported 
to be much opposed to it and it is about to be 
used in Alaska as a means with which to attack 
Delegate Daniel A. Sutherland in his coming 
campaign for re-election. On the other hand, 
many of the best men of Alaska are cordially 
supporting the bill, and for a score of excellent 
reasons it is to be hoped that Congress will 
speedily enact the Nelson bill into statute law. 
A GRAY SEA-LION 
The standard color of the California sea-lion 
(Zalophus californicus) is either light or dark 
chocolate brown. As it emerges from the water 
the animal is of the color known to artists as 
Vandyke brown, which is next thing to moderate 
black. In the standardized animal the dry coat 
is of course lighter than the wet, but still it is 
a brown animal. 
In the sea-lion pool in the middle of Baird 
Court there is an adult female Zalophus that is 
conspicuously gray. This light tone is so strik¬ 
ing as to render the animal conspicuous even at 
a distance. It is almost as light as the weath¬ 
ered granite coping around the grass plot. The 
back is slightly darker than other portions of 
the body, but this difference is scarcely notice¬ 
able. 
This is the first time in twenty years witli 
Zalophus calif ornicus that a specimen of this 
color ever has come into our possession. In 
fact, it is about half-way to real albinism. 
