Our Arctic province

by Henry Wood Elliott

It is entertaining to note, in this connection, that the Russians themselves, with the object of testing that mooted query, during the later years of their possession of the islands, drove up a number of young males from Lukannon, cut off their ears, and turned them out to sea again. The following season, when the droves came in from the “hauling-grounds” to the slaughtering-fields, quite a number of those cropped seals were in the drives, but instead of being found all at one place—the place from whence they were driven the year before—they were scattered examples of croppies from every point on the island. The same experiment was again made by our people in 1870 (the natives having told them of such prior undertaking), and they went also to Lukannon, drove up one hundred young males, cut off their left ears, and set them free in turn. Of this number, during the summer of 1872, when I was there, the natives found in their driving of seventy-five thousand seals from the different hauling-grounds of St. Paul up to the village killing-grounds, two on Novastoshnah rookery, ten miles north of Lukannon, and two or three from English Bay and Tolstoi rookeries, six miles west by water; one or two were taken on St. George Island, thirty-six miles to the southeast, and not one from Lukannon was found among those that were driven from there; probably, had all the young males on the two islands this season been examined, the rest of the croppies that had returned from the perils of the deep, whence they sojourned during the winter, would have been distributed quite equally about the Pribylov hauling-grounds. Although the natives say that they think the cutting off of the animal’s ear gives the water such access to its head as to cause its death, yet I noticed that those examples which we had recognized by this auricular mutilation, were normally fat and well developed. Their theory does not appeal to my belief, and it certainly requires confirmation.

These experiments would tend to prove very cogently and conclusively that when the seals approach the islands in the spring they have nothing in their minds but a general instinctive appreciation of the fitness of the land as a whole, and no special fondness or determination to select any one particular spot, not even the place of their birth. A study of my map of the distribution of the seal-life on St. Paul, clearly indicates that the landing of the seals on the respective rookeries is influenced greatly by the direction of the wind at the time of their approach to the islands in the spring and early summer. The prevailing airs, blowing, as they do at that season, from the north and northwest, carry far out to sea the odor of the old rookery flats, together with a fresh scent of the pioneer bulls which have located themselves on these breeding grounds three or four weeks in advance of their kind. The seals come up from the great North Pacific, and hence it will be seen that the rookeries of the south and southeastern shores of St. Paul Island receive nearly all the seal-life, although there are miles of perfectly eligible ground at Nahsayvernia or north shore. To settle this matter beyond all argument, however, I know is an exceedingly difficult task, since the identification of individuals, from one season to another, among the hundreds of thousands, and even millions, that come under your eye on one of these great rookeries, is well-nigh impossible. From the time of the first arrival in May up to the beginning of June, or as late as the middle of that month, if the weather be clear, is an interval in which everything seems quiet. Very few seals are added to the pioneers that have landed, as we have described. About June 1st, however, sometimes a little before, and never much later, the seal-weather—the foggy, humid, oozy damp of summer—sets in; and with it, as the gray banks roll up and shroud the islands, old bull-seals swarm from the depths by hundreds and thousands, and locate themselves in advantageous positions for the reception of the females, which are generally three weeks or a month later than this date in arrival.

It appears from my surrey of these breeding grounds that a well-understood principle exists among the able-bodied males, to-wit: that each one shall remain undisturbed on his own ground, which is usually about six to eight feet square: provided, that at the start, and from that time until the arrival of the females, he is strong enough to hold this ground against all comers; inasmuch as the crowding in of fresh arrivals often causes a removal of those which, though equally able-bodied at first, have exhausted themselves by fighting earlier and constantly, they are finally driven by these fresher animals back farther and higher up on the rookery, and sometimes off altogether.

The labor of locating and maintaining a position on the rookery is real, terrible and serious business for these bulls which come in last, and it is so all the time to those males that occupy the water-line of the breeding grounds. A constantly sustained fight between the new-comers and the occupants goes on morning, noon, and night, without cessation, frequently resulting in death to one, or even both, of the combatants. The “seecatchie” under six years of age, although hovering about the sea-margins of the breeding grounds, do not engage in much fighting there; it is the six and seven year old males, ambitious and flushed with a full sense of their reproductive ability, that swarm out and do battle with the older males of these places. A young male of this latter class is, however, no match for any fifteen or twenty year old bull, provided that an old “seecatchie” retains his teeth; for, with these weapons, his relatively harder thews and sinews give him the advantage in almost every instance among the hundreds of combats that I have witnessed. These trials of strength between the old and the young are incessant until the rookeries are mapped out; since, by common consent, the males of all classes recognize the coming of the females. After their arrival and settlement over the whole extent of the breeding grounds, about July 15th at the latest, very little fighting takes place.

Many of those bulls exhibit wonderful strength and desperate courage. I marked one veteran at Gorbatch, who was the first to take up his position early in May, and that position, as usual, directly on the water-line. This male seal had fought at least forty or fifty desperate battles, and beaten off his assailants every time—perhaps nearly as many different seals each of which had coveted his position—when the fighting season was over (after the cows are mostly all hauled up), I saw him still there, covered with scars and frightfully gashed—raw, festering, and bloody, one eye gouged out—but lording it bravely over his harem of fifteen or twenty females, which were all huddled together around him on the same spot of his first location.

This fighting between the old and adult males (for none others fight) is mostly, or rather entirely, done with the mouth. The opponents seize one another with their teeth, and thus clinching their jaws, nothing but the sheer strength of the one and the other tugging to escape can shake them loose; then, that effort invariably leaves an ugly wound, for the sharp canines tear out deep gutters in the skin and furrows in the blubber, or shred the flippers into ribbon-strips.

They usually approach each other with comically averted heads, just as though they were ashamed of the rumpus which they are determined to precipitate. When they get near enough to reach one another, they enter upon the repetition of many feints or passes before either one or the other takes the initiative by gripping. The heads are darted out and back as quick as a flash; their hoarse roaring and shrill, piping whistle never ceases, while their fat bodies writhe and swell with exertion and rage; furious lights gleam in their eyes, their hair flies in the air, and their blood streams down,—all combined makes a picture so fierce and so strange that, from its unexpected position and its novelty, it is perhaps one of the most extraordinary brutal contests which a man can witness.

In these battles of the seals the parties are always distinct; the one is offensive, the other, defensive. If the latter proves the weaker, he withdraws from the position occupied, and is never followed by his conqueror, who complacently throws up one of his hind flippers, fans himself, as it were, to cool his fevered wrath and blood from the heat of the conflict, sinks into comparative quiet, only uttering a peculiar chuckle of satisfaction or contempt, with a sharp eye open for another covetous bull or “see-catch.”[111]

OLD BULLS FIGHTING