The studies of Greenwood, Newcombe and Fraser (1918: 1-39) show that the Steller sea lions eat a great variety of marine fish and other sea life. Included in their diet are squid, starfish, crabs, clams, mussels, salmon, herring, flounder, rock cod, sea bass and dogfish. They seem not to be selective in their food habits but eat the food most easily available at the time. Unfortunately this is occasionally salmon in nets or traps and for this reason fishermen usually kill sea lions on sight. The number of sea lions along the coast of Washington has been greatly reduced by shooting and dynamiting the animals on their hauling-out grounds. There is no doubt that sea lions do occasionally eat salmon, especially in traps or nets. They also become entangled in the nets, and damage them. On the other hand, investigations of their food habits have shown that they do not eat any great number of salmon or other important food fishes. They are a relatively harmless and exceedingly interesting animal and might well be preserved in numbers exceeding their present population. Until relatively recent times the sea lion was an important source of food to the Indians living along the ocean coast. The bones of sea lions are often the most numerous vertebrate remains in shell mounds. The Steller sea lion now breeds only in a few places along the coast of Washington. They are polygamous and each of the stronger bulls has eight or ten cows in his harem. Fierce battles between bulls are said to take place in the breeding season, late in May. A single pup is born after a gestation period of about one year. Pups are darker in color than adults. =Callorhinus ursinus cynocephalus= (Walbaum) Alaska fur seal _Siren cynocephalus_ Walbaum, Petri Artedi Sueci Genera Pisc., p. 560, 1792. _Callorhinus ursinus_ True, Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus., 7 (1884):607, 1885. _Callorhinus alascanus_ Jordan and Clark, Fur Seals and Fur Seal Islands of the North Pacific, pt. 3, p. 2, November, 1899. _Callotaria ursina cynocephala_ Stejneger, George Wilhelm Steller, Harvard Univ. Press, p. 285, 1936. _Type locality._--Pribilof Islands, Alaska. _Distribution._--Breeds on the Pribilof Islands, Alaska. Abundant off the coast of Washington on migration. _Description._--The difference in the size of male and female fur seals is great. Males are about 8 feet in length when fully grown but the females are only about 4 feet long. Males weigh up to 700 pounds but females only about 100 pounds. In general appearance the fur seal resembles the sea lion but the fur is longer, denser and softer. Males are very dark brown in color. Females and young are grayish brown. The fur seal, like the sea lion, can reverse its hind flippers and use them to a certain extent in walking.