The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-12-11
THE SEALS DISAPPEARING.
Only "a short Time when Few of Them
VIII he Left.

David Starr Jordan, in New York Herald
The regulations governing the killing of
the fur seal about the Russian seal ISLANDS
of Komandorsk are the thirty-mie zone,
which no vessel can invade, and the restric-
ton Of all killing to superduous young
males, which are selected ana killed on
subject TO seizure, and the crew may be
sent to the mines of Saghalien.
1t is. however. true that the regulations
governing the American or Pribyloff islands
are much more stringent than these. The
crossed zone is of sixty miles radius. ANY
vessel entering this area is subject TO selz-
ure. Five vessels, three British and two
American. entering this zone in 1861 We're
seized and sold. the order for the sale of the
British vessels being made by the courts or
Victoria, B. c.. Moreover, May, June and
July, three of the most favorable months,
are wholly closed to sealing operations, and
no guns are allowed in Boring sea-
These regulations laid down by the Paris
tribunal of arbitration, have been accepted
and enforced both by England and the
United States. They had the effect to limit
sealing operations somewhat, but their in
f1uence in stimulating them was vastly
greater, because ii made them legal Pelagic
sealing before this was esteemed species
of adventure or piracy. 1t now became
business under protection of international
law.
BY land killing only part of the super
fluous young males are taken since its
status was fixed by Russia in 1799 In sea
killing no regard is paid to age or sex.
Three-fourths of those taken at sea have
been gravid females. For each female slain
left on shore to starve.
AS a matter of fact, the strictest regula-
lions governing the American herd have
been of no avail The indiscriminate killing
of females has commercially ruined all the
herds alike. The natural increase of the
breeding herd is about z per cent. Since
1885 from 10 to 40 per cent. of the Amer
lean herd has been each year slaughtered
at sea, and since 1891 from 20 to so per cent.
of the Russian herd each year.
The breeding females are the life of the
herd as only one male in thirty is allowed
to enter it, and males have always existed
in great superabundance. Since 1885 the
American herd has fallen from 100000 breed
ing females to 1870 coo, the Russian herd from
300 900 to about J0,000 the Kurili herd from
about 10000 to 1900, that part of it belonging
against $4,000 formerly. The Mexican herd,
on Guadalupe island, once numbering
about 10000, is now extinct.
The sole cause, Of decline has been in all
cases the same-the indscriminate killing
of females. For this great international
crime two nations are solely responsible.
They are Great Britain and the United
States.
One great obstacle to the success of nego-
tiations in the past is the fact that we have
never come into any conference with clean
hands American hands have destroyed
One-third of our own herd, which once had
a cash value Of $25 1900, and more than
half the devastation of other herds has been
due to American enterprise. We have al
lowed our pirates to destroy the seal herds
Of ourselves and our neghbOrs, Just as we
allow squatters to burn off our forests to
improve the feed for their sheep.
English they be, and Japanee,.
That hang on the brown bears flank;
And Some be Scot, but the worst God wot,
And the boldest thieves, be Yank.
If nations were as honest and as Just in
to be, the whole seal controversy could be
settled in day, and 1t must be settled.