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23 January 1914.]

WHALINO COMMITTEE !

Mr. D. G. LILLIE.

investigation to make sure of this. There is evidence to show, from what I have gathered from whaling captaitis, that some such migration from north to south takes place, although dates could not be given in these regions as in New Zealand. My observations are only of Humpbacks. The Balaenoptera musculus and Balaenoptera sibbaldii migrations I would not like to say much about; they do not seem to come so close in shore as the Humpleks, and they cannot be examined quite so readily. With regard to the Southern Right whale migrations, as far as I can make out they are found off Campbell Island to the south of New Zealand from March to August, and that seems to be the only time it really pays to hunt them there. In South Georgia they are found from January to April; in the South Shetlands they do not turn up until March, and they are never seeu south of the pack-ice.

It

is possible that they may go north into the warm sens to breed during the summer. October to May used to be the best season uff the Chathame and Nor- folk Island for fishing this whale. The Balaenoptera musculus and Balaenoptera sibbaldii in the Southern Hemisphere appear off the South Shetlands and South Georgia and in the Ross Sea, and they are seen there in greatest numbers in the summer from November to March, but, of course, you cannot be sure whether they are there in the winter, because nobody is looking out. The whaling season has to shut down in March, and nobody in the Antarctic can see anything after May, because it begins to get dark. It is quite possible the whales may be there and people do not see them. The whaling people when they have finished in the South Shetlands go up to the west of South America, and during April and May they get the Balaenoptera musculus and Balaenoptera sibbaldii off the coast of Chile, and it looks rather as if the whales were leaving the cold and going up in April and May to spend the winter off the Chile coast. Their movements may be something like the Humpback, but much more work would have to be done before anything definite could be said. That is about all I can say as regards number 2, 339. Do you think, now, it would be possible roughly (one could only quite roughly do it) to obart those migrations which you have mentioned-Yes, but I would only undertake to do it off the New Zealand coart.

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With a little more investigation one could find out about the African coasts and the coasts of Western Australia and South America, but I would not like to chart any of those yet. I believe it would be quite possible to get information from the captains on which you could rely. I cross-examined whaling captains to some extent, and I tried to test them and find out if their stories varied, but I found such common opinions among the whalers that I felt I could trust them. think before charting I would sooner wait and get more evidence as to these other parts, because New Zealand by itself is only a small area; it is such a small fishery compared to these others. Charting the migrations of whales is a bit of work which ought to be carried out. Major Barrett-Hamilton is down there, and I am hoping that he may come home with data from South Georgia. If we could get the South American side cleared up it would be a very good bit of work.

340. At any rate you are quite clearly of opinion that there are definite migrations which, with a little investigation, could be charted out?—Yes, it simply means work.

341. I am really dealing with a question you are to be dealing with later; would you go so far as to say you think that the migrations are so clearly marked that one could possibly arrive at arms to which they migrate and in which they breed P-There are areas round the coasts of South America, South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand, which it will be necessary to legis. late about. If you drive whalers away from one area they would go to another, and the only areas which are useless to the whalers are the open oceans, partly because their plant cannot work there, and partly because there are fewer whales there.

342. That is the difficulty; if you stopped a certain ares an a breeding area you are probably by closing it going to interfere with somebody's whaling interests ?— Yes.

[Continued.

343. It may be with the whaling interests of a par- ticular country?—Yes.

344. With their property, so to speak, in the whaling stations ?—Yes, it becomes very complicated if you start to mark out areas.

345. At the same time you think this migration could be charted roughly, and that you could indioute definite parturition areas P-I am not going to be so sure about the parturition, but I will tell you what evidence we have got.

346. (Mr. Baker.) Do you think it practically essen- tial for the whales to go up northwards in order that the cows may give birth to the calves?—It appears so; they do give birth to their young in the warmer waters. It may be that the weather is so bad or uncertain in the south. Unless it is for giving birth to the calf. I do not see why they should go out of the cold waters, because there is more food there.

347. Possibly also, as Mr. Burfield suggested, they like to go to shallower waters to give birth to the calves? Yes, it so happens that the waters they do go to apparently for breeding are on the whole shallower, but there are plenty of places where they seem to go to breed which are very deep; you do not get much shallow water except near the coast in the Southern Hemisphere. I would prefer to say they go to warm waters rather than to shallow waters in the Southern Hemisphere. If they had to go to the shallow waters for breeding you would have an immense crowd of whales trying to make use of what few shallow areas there are.

348. By breeding you mean parturition ?—Yes. 349. (Mr. Holt.) Have you heard a definite state- ment that Humpback whales move north and breed in the Bight of Biafra or some such place? The state- ment has been very definitely made in the paper sub- mitted to us?—The west of Africa is the part of the Southern Hemisphere of which I know least. I can only say they are supposed to go north, but I could not tell you definite places. All I know is, from the men I have been talking to, that they have noticed northerly movements, but they have given no definite spots. On the east coast, at Durban, I believe they noticed it; they seemed to go north off Durban more or less at the same time as the New Zealand ones.

350). (Chairman.) The latest information we have had in the nature of a report is about the movement of whales on the west coast: "at Pert Alexander it was observed that the whales on their way north were fat and in better condition than on their return."-I have the same information from New Zealand; I have measured the blubber and I know that fact is perfectly right.

351. The assumption is that they go up there at the top of their condition and you think to breed P--- Yes, they lose flesh up there, and they can surely only do this for breeding.

352. (Mr. Holl.) I think they have been actually observed calving up in wherever it is they go-the mouth of the Congo and thereabouts.

(Chairman.) We were told fairly emphatically that was the breeding area.

(Mr. Holt.) Captain Bruun has told me also that he knows that of his own knowledge; that would account for Mr. Lillie's migration.

(Witness.) I will come on to that now; I think I have got some evidence about the breeding habits.

353. (Mr. Lamb.) Before going to that, if you were to set up a system of protection, prohibiting fishing in certain areas, there would be no particular advantage in choosing a parturition area P-It seems to me there are so many places; these whales are scattered all round the Antarctic, and I do not see why they should prefer New Zealand or South America at all, and it appears to me unless you legislated in all places simultaneously you would not gain much.

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354. Supposing that you could select all the parturi- tion areas for all the kinds of whales, there would be no particular object in selecting these areas, looking to the long period of gestation and the long period the calf is not self-supporting afterwards P—Yes.

355. To stop whaling in any area frequented by whalos serve qqually

MINUTES OF EVIDENCE,

Mr. D. G. LILLIE.

23 January 1914.]

think it would do on the whole. I think you must keep to the areas near land. I think the chief thing in the areas off consts, they are more important as they are more frequented by whales, and I do not think you need worry about the open seas at all.

356. That adds another difficulty to getting any. thing like international agreement; that is, it would not suffice to argue to this country: "As a matter of fact your area is a parturition area," because the answer would be, "You might just as well close some other area, you will get as good results, why choose ours ? "........ Yes, that would always be done.

357. (Chairman.) I should imagine that the whales which are near the point of parturition are more defenceless, less capable of taking care of themselves, or would you say that P-1 would not like to say that. They do not appear to be any slower. I have asked whether a gravid female about to give birth is slower, and the whalers said they did not notice it. I have asked whether they could tell whether the female is in calf, but they cannot even tell the male from the female in the water, much less whether she is gravid or not, because they only see a bit of the back.

358. I would have imagined that at that period the female would have been particularly defenceless P-It is possible, but I have never heard that.

359. (Mr. Vernon.) Your evidence is only of the general migration south and north. Supposing one takes the South Georgia whales, you could not say with confidence that they follow the coast of the South American continent. It is possible that they may follow one of the other lines of migration?—I should say that the South Georgia whales tend to go up one or other of the sides of the South American coast. All I can say for certain is what is happening in New Zealand. 360. Therefore you think it is improbable that the whales found, say, on the west coast of South Africa are identical with the South Georgia whales, that they are the same whales which migrate from South Georgia ?—I should think it probable that the South Georgian whale would go up the coast of South America. I should think it is more likely that the Kerguelen whales would go up the coast of South Africa.

361. Do you think there is any way of proving that? It has been suggested that by means of accurate measurement of the whales, caught in two places, one could practically determine the identity of the herd; do you think there is anything in that --No, I certainly do not; I think it very far-fetched. It seems to me it is fairly easy to find out what whales are doing by making the people at the stations tell you when they see the whales going north and coming south, and there is no difficulty about Humpbacks. Whalers do not appear to be ao certain about the others. The Megaptera seem very definite; off the New Zealand coast they are always going in one direction or the other and they change at A definite time. I would suggest that the above ques tion be naked on the stations on both sides of South America and South Africa, and you should get definite answers; also ask whether the blubber is thicker on the way north or south. That is a question it would be easy to answer.

362. (Mr. Lamb.) Is the movement of whales only north and south-As regards the Megaptera there seems to be no other movement noticed.

363. If you were to have a system of protection which affected, say, the whales moving on the coast of North and South America, the supply there would not be affected by over-fishing only ?--It is quite possible that it would not. Yet it looks as if each district has its own supply. They appear to concentrate on a point in the Antarctic, and then radiate up.

364. There may be a leakage from one area into another P-Yes, a whale accustomed to go to the New Zealand area might suddenly take it into his head to go to the South American area. Nobody knows.

365. The only thing which would tempt them to change would be when the food supply went off; if there were fewer whales going in the one direction the food supply would be better P-Yes; they always go about in herds. It seems to be nothing to do with food supply their going north, because they are doing a very

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[Continued.

foolish thing from the point of view of food, to go north at all. They are probably doing it for breeding

purposes.

366. Presumably if they had a choice when starting they would start on the fattest lines ?—I suppose they would.

367. (Chairman.) You say you are speaking really almost exclusively of the Humpback --Yes, I am. With regard to the Balaenoptera it seems as if with some further work some similar migration might be found to occur, but I have not got the evidence here.

368. It occurs to me that the evidence Mr. Burfield gave us was rather in favour of a northward migration to breed as in this case, but that whereas in the me case it is a movement from colder water to warnier water, in the other case it is a movement from warmer water to colder water ?--Yes, the Megaptera appear to choose warmer water, but the Balaenoptera, according to Mr. Burfield, choose the cold, and that did rather surprise me. I do not pretend to know about the Balaenoptera, because I could not get any information; nobody could tell me where they bred.

369. (Mr. Holt.) Megaptera is a shallow-water beast, and would naturally be affected a great deal by changes of sea temperature in its neighbourhood, whereas Balaenoptera would be less affected in that way?—That may be so, the Balaenoptera may be more impartial as to where they are calving.

370. (Chairman.) Would that be because they are on the surface all the time ?--It seems to me it would be possible to get information about that by sending somebody to study what happens off the coast of Chile, as the whalers undoubtedly find tremendous supplies of Balaenoptera there from April and May onwards, and it pays them to hunt there then. They are not so sure that the Balaenoptera are as plentiful there at other times of the year. April, May, June and July are the more wintry months. In the summer months they go to South Georgia and find them there. Nobody can say whether they are also in South Georgia during the winter, but it looks as if they did go north. Whalers think they leave the cold waters and go up north, but whether they breed there or not they do not know, because the Balaenoptera stay more out at sea and are not easy to watch.

371. (Chairman.) For whatever purpose, there is a movement similar to the movement of the Humpback ? -That seems to be so.

Many of

372. May we take the third head now -Yes. The Humpback whales are seen off the Bay of Islands from August to December with suckling young, them were seen during the two years I was there; a considerable number. The mothers were shot and the calves left. In July I obtained a 13 ft. fœtus ont of a mother, and the approximate size of a Humpback when born is about 14 or 15 ft. On 10th October 1912 I got a fœtus embryo 2 in. long taken from a mother going south. It is possible that the fertilisation of the egg which produced this 24 in. embryo took place about July in the warm seas, and the birth night have occurred during the following August when the mother returned to the warm seas. That would make the period of gustation about 13 months. It is very curious to get an embryo 24 in, long and also an embryo 13 ft. long, but the one which was 13 ft. long was just about to be born, whereas the one 24 in. long was perhaps three months since fertilisation. It looks as though these whales go north to breed in the winter in the warm seas, and 'very possibly copulation may take place up there as well. This female was going south with its 24 in. embryo, and according to the general idea she would return next winter with the embryo grown possibly to 14 ft. and would be ready for birth. One could expect the birth to take place between June and August. August is about the month the majority are supposed to be giving birth to their calves. I saw two or three nearly full-time foetuses, and I think a couple of dozen calves swimming beside the mother were noticed. So on the whole (whalers seem to have no doubt about it themselves) the evidence seems to be fairly clear.

373. That in in favour of 13 months for the Humpbacks P-Yee, 12 or 13 months. As regards the Balaenoptera when I was on the Iniske Station I got

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