SEAL KILLING AT SEA OR PELAGIC SEALING.

Manner of hunting.

Pelagic sealing is carried on chiefly by means Vessels and crew. of schooners, each of which is provided with a crew of twenty to twenty-five men and several small boats for hunting. When seals are encountered the small boats put out and the hunting begins. If a seal is seen on the surface the hunter approaches it as quietly as possible, and when near enough shoots it with the shotgun or rifle; but most seals are shot as they rise within range of the boat. When a seal is shot the oarsman pulls toward it as rapidly as possible in the hope of reaching it before it sinks. By the aid The gaff. of an iron hook on the end of a light pole many

seals are secured after they have sunk below the

surface but have not yet passed out of reach. Some of the sealing vessels use steam power, but most of them depend on sails.

Formerly, Indian crews were taken almost Indian hunters exclusively, and the spear was used instead of firearms, in order not to frighten the seals. This method had the great advantage of securing nearly all seals wounded. Now, both Indian and white hunters are employed, and the use of the spear has been almost wholly superseded by the use of firearms. The shotgun is used more than the rifle for the reason that fewer wounded seals are lost thereby.

Indian hunters.

History.

Destruction female seals.

In addition to the destruction wrought by the sealing schooners, pelagic sealing is still carried on along shore by the native Indians in their canoes, but the number of fur-seals thus killed is relatively small.

Pelagic sealing has been carried on fortuitously and on a small scale for many years, but it was not until within the present decade that numerous vessels engaged systematically in the enterprise. The profits are so great in comparison with the capital invested that, as the results of the annual catch became known each year, a constantly increasing number of vessels was led to engage in the industry, with a corresponding increase in the number of seals killed in the open of sea. The fur-seals which move northward along the coast of the Northwestern United States, British Columbia, and southeastern Alaska from January until late in June are chiefly pregnant females, and about ninety per cent of the adult seals killed by pelagic sealers in the North Pacific are females heavy with young.

Pelagic sealers enter Bering Sea.

For several years the pelagic sealers were content to pursue their destructive work in the North Pacific, but of late they have entered Bering Sea, where they continue to capture seals in the water throughout the entire summer.

The

killed.

rookeries.

females killed during this period are giving Nursing females milk, and are away from the islands in search of food. Their young starve to death on the rookeries. We saw vast numbers of dead pups on Dead pups on the the island of St. Paul last summer (1891), which, from their emaciated condition, had evidently died of starvation. The total number of their carcasses remaining on the Pribilof Islands at the end of the season of 1891 has been estimated by the United States Treasury agents at not less than twenty thousand.

Bering Sea scal

Pelagic sealing is now carried on in the North ing season. Pacific Ocean from January until late in June, and in Bering Sea in July, August, and Septem ber. Some sealing schooners remain as late as November, but they do so for the purpose of raiding the rookeries.

Catch of scaling

The number of seals secured by pelagiccatis. sealers is exceedingly difficult to ascertain, because no complete record has been kept of any except those sold in Victoria, British Columbia. Many thousands have been sold in San Francisco, concerning which we have not been able as yet to obtain reliable information.

The number of seal skins actually recorded as sold as a result of pelagic sealing is shown in the following table:*

killing.

Number estimated from value given.

Indiscriminate It can not be denied that in pelagic sealing there can be no selective killing, as far as individual seals are concerned, and only in a limited degree by restricting it as to place and time. It necessarily follows that female seals must be killed and seals whose skins owing to age and condition are much less desirable. As

* The figures for the years 1872 to 1876, inclusive, and 1891, are from the London Trade Sales. Those from 1877 to 1887, inclusive, are from the official reports of the Minister of Marine and Fisheries of Canada, and probably fall short of the actual catch, because the catch of the United States vessels is not included. The figures for 1888 are from the same source (26,983) plus the United States pelagic catch (9,806), as stated in the Report of the United States Commissioner of Fish and Fisheries for that year. The figures for the years 1889 and 1890 are from the Canadian Fisheries Reports, and comprise both the catch of the Canadian fleet (33,570 for 1889 and 44,750 for 1890) and of other vessels which sold their skins in Victoria, British Columbia (7,428 in 1889 and 3,768 in 1890). The catch of American vessels sold in San Francisco is not included.

females in catch.

a matter of fact, there is sufficient evidence to Percentage of convince us that by far the greater part of the seals taken at sea are females; indeed, we have yet to meet with any evidence to the contrary. The statements of those who have had occasion to examine the catch of pelagic sealers might be quoted to almost any extent to the effect that at least eighty percent of the seals thus taken are females. On one occasion we examined a pile of skins picked out at random, and which wo have every reason to believe was a part of a pelagic catch, and found them nearly all females. When the sealers themselves are not influenced by the feeling that they are testifying against their own interests they give similar testimony. The master of the sealing schooner J. G. Swan declared that in the catch of 1890, when he secured several hundred seals, the proportion of females to males was about four to one, and on one occasion in a lot of sixty seals, as a matter of curiosity he counted the number of females with young, finding forty-seven.

Evidence on this point might be extended indefinitely, but one or two additional references will be valuable. The following is from Messrs. Letter of C. M. Lampson & Co. C. M. Lampson & Co., of London, the most extensive dealers in furs in the world, and everywhere