In the summer of 1925 
My Keishi Ishino, the scientist 
in charge of fur seal work for 
the Japanese Bureau of Fisher- 
ies, while investigating breed-~ 
ing conditions on the Commander 
Islands noted in the Hugo Sta- 
tine rookery on Medney Island 
three male seals bearing brand 
marks on their backs. With 
permiseion one of them was. 
killed for closer examination 
and was found also to have been 
sheared on the head. These 
marke were identical to branding 
and shearing done the previous 
season on the Pribllofs. The 
following sumer Mr Ishino die- 
covered a similarly sheared seal 
on Robben Island. The watchmen 
on the ielend reported observing 
three other marked animale there 
during the summers of 1927, 1928, 
: and 1929, one of which was col- 
Figure 8. = Tage from Fribilof seals recov- lected in 1929. 
ered in Japanese waters in 1929-30 





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In 1929 a Hokkaido salmon fisherman sent to the Japanese Bureau of Fisheries a 
numbered metal tag which he found on a seal taken accidentally in his nete off Muroran. 
The Bureau sent photographs of the tag to the United States Bureau of Fisheries, which 
verified it as one attached to a seal in the Pribilofs in 1928. In the spring of 1930 
Japanese Fisheries officials recovered two more 1928 Pribilof tags taken similarly the 
preceding season by drift-net fishermen off the east coast of Honehu (Figure 8). The of- 
ficials also unearthed reports of 25 more tagged seals taken by poacherea off Honshu and 
Hokkaido between 1928 and 1930, These reports could not be verified further because the 
tage either had been discarded by the fishermen who did not realise or care about their 
ecientifitc value, or else had been purposely thrown overboard to destroy incriminating 
evidence of poaching. The Bureau of Fisheries published these data in 1923 in a very in- 
teresting pamphlet, apparently written to justify the Japanese request for a revision of 
the treaty. Two identical editions were printed simultaneously, one in English, the other 
in Japanese (Bibl 284, 285), but neither was given any circulation outside Japan, although 
the English edition could have been issued only for foreign consumption. American author 
ities apparently knew nothing of this publication until a copy of the English version ob- 
tained from the Japanese Bureau of Fisheries was forwarded by Natural Resources Section 
to the Department of State in Washington 6 June 1946. 
The failure of the Japanese to circulate this report to bolster their case is 
difficult to rationalize. Of course, as Japanese foreign policy was changing from one of 
cooperation to a militant aggressiveness, the government was becoming extremely secretive 
with all information, especially with any data of possible military significance. Another 
possibility ia that this brief was meant to be sprung on a future convention suddenly, to 
prevent the opposition from amassing evidence to contradict it. More probably, however, 
the Japanese realized just how weak their case was scientifically. About all this paper 
proves beyond question is that some Pribilof seals do visit Japanese coastal waters. Its 
suggestion that Commander and Robben Island animals migrate to and land on the Fribilofs 
is not warranted by the available evidence; even more important, the implication that one- 
half of the Pribilof seals vieit Japanese waters is not a valid conclusion, although it was 
to be used later to estimate the number of seals preying on the Japanese fisheries. 
24 
