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Canadian Seal Hunt to End Early As Demand For Seals Decreases
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by Amy Judd | April 17, 2010 at 03:16 pm
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The Canadian Seal Hunt Will End Early in 2010
An exceptionally warm winter, lack of interest in purchasing seal products and a European boycott on Canadian seal products have forced the Canadian seal hunt to end early in 2010.
Canadian sealers and the government were expecting a successful year of seal hunting, especially after Gail Shea, the Canadian Fisheries Minister increased the number of harp seals allowed to be caught from 280,000 to 330,000, but even this increase could not tempt seal hunters out to the ice.
Many did not participate in this year's seal hunt because less buyers are interested in taking the pelts off their hands. This is also the first year in the last 60 years that the ice floes in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence have been obstructed making it hard for the seals and hunters to reach them.
The European boycott was devastating to the industry this year, as was the lack of ice on the Gulf of Saint Lawrence due to an exceptionally warm winter," Jean Richard, Canadian fisheries department conservation chief for the Quebec coastal region, told AFP.
Past years have seen up to 500 sealing ships leave from the Newfoundland ports; this year there were less than 50. With only one local guaranteed buyer this year as well, the demand is down so much many sealers preferred to stay home. Seal pelts are being priced at 21 dollars US each however, which is almost double last year's prices, but there is not enough demand.
Larry Yetman from the fisheries resource management office for Newfoundland and Labrador said:
Unfortunately, we expect market demand to be satisfied in a couple of days, and then we would talk about closing the hunt," likely after less than 15 percent of the quota has been reached
If the seal hunt was stopped altogether it is unknown if the population would adjust or simply spiral out of control. Seals are responsible for eating a lot of fish and too many of them in one place can severely deplete fish stocks.
For now the hunt continues and perhaps another solution will have to be found for next year.
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Most RecentMost Recommended Comments (4)
at 06:34 on April 18th, 2010
It is interesting that despite a marked lack of markets for seal skins this year, the largest buyer bowing out since they haven't have been able to sell previous years' stock, and sealers admitting they are throwing pelts back into the water, one local purchaser - based in Newfoundland and rumoured to be a subsidary of Newfoundland fisheries mogul Barry Group - is offering $21 per skin to a select group of sealers. Could this be a government subsidy? Could it be that Canadians' tax dollars are buying those skins? I've just returned from observing the commercial seal kill in Newfoundland. We documented horrific cruelty and multiple violations of sealers' license conditions. The so-called "three-step-process" the Canadian government introduced a couple of years ago to stave off the anticipated EU-wide seal product trade ban was not being implemented by sealers. Sealers were shooting pups and leaving them on the ice suffering for minutes at a time; sealers were not checking for consciousness as they are required by law to do but were simply impaling the pups on hooks and hauling them across the ice while the pups showed conscious reaction to pain; sealers were not bleeding the pups as they are required by law to do but were simply slicing them open and leaving them on deck. The Canadian commercial seal hunt is inherently inhumane. The industry is unprofitable, relying on government subsidies paid with Canadian taxpayers' money. World markets are shutting down. It's time to abolish this outmoded and cruel practice and implement a comprehensive buyout package to compensate sealers and build a better future for ourselves and our oceans.
at 10:45 on April 18th, 2010
Leave God's animals alone, and go on with your life. God's animals have just as much right to live as you do. If you were a truly good humane human you would be helping animals in need, not threatening them and killing them. Be kind, empathetic, and love all of God's beautiful animals, it just might make your life a lot better.
at 08:06 on April 19th, 2010
Historically, there used to be a lot more seals, whales, sharks, dolphins, etc in our oceans - and there was an abundance of fish. Ecologists believe that the seal herd used to have 30-40 million and the oceans were teeming with cod. Now there is a fraction of that number of seals and virtually no cod. The ocean ecosystem is very complex and marine life is very interdependent. What is known is that seals are important to the ocean in a few ways. The first is that they give an abundance of nutrients back to the ocean in the form of feces and urine, which nourishes the plankton, which in turn feeds the fish. The second is that seals eat other fish predators - such as jellyfish. The third is that seals are fairly high up on the predatory chain and actually strengthen the fish by picking off the old and weak - just like in any other predator / prey food chain. Isn't it possible that when we deplete the numbers of seals, the numbers of other fish predators multiply unchecked, therefore further depleting the number of fish?!! I wish everyone would stop blaming the seals for eating fish. Seals have just as much right to eat fish as humans do. It is human overfishing and mismangagement that are causing a collapse in fishing industries worldwide. Finally, the Department of Fisheries even states that seal hunt is NOT conducted in order to control the seal population, so this shouldn't even be mentioned in this article.
at 17:41 on May 6th, 2010
Right on target Kim.