The Seal Hunt Begins Again....

[Cataholic]

Every year I receive email notification of this horrible occurrence. It sickens my heart and soul. I don't know how to make it stop, though I do continue to contribute to the Humane Society.

Please help them stop this.


https://community.hsus.org/humane/no...er_id=21845597

[Cinder & Smoke]

I don't know how to make it stop,
though I do continue to contribute to the Humane Society.

Don't by seal products!

Thankfully, buying seal products is outlawed in the USA ...
from MSNBC.com >>>

"People around the world are shocked to know that Canada, which is perceived as one of the most progressive nations in the world, allows this outdated, archaic slaughter to continue," Aldworth said.
The United States has banned Canadian seal products since 1972. The Netherlands and Belgium also ban seal products. The European Union is considering a ban on all seal products, having outlawed the sale of the white pelts of baby seals in 1983.

Youngest pups can't be killed
Registered hunters in Canada are now not allowed to kill seal pups that haven't molted their downy white fur, typically when 10 to 21 days old.

Animal-rights groups say the seal hunt, the largest marine mammal hunt in the world, is cruel, difficult to monitor, ravages the seal population and doesn't provide a lot of money for sealers.

Sealers and the Fisheries Department defend the hunt as sustainable, humane and well-managed and say it provides supplemental income for isolated fishing communities that have been hurt by the decline in cod stocks.

Fishermen sell seal pelts mostly for the fashion industry in Norway, Russia and China, as well as blubber for oil, earning about $78 for each seal. The 2006 take of some 335,000 seals brought in about $25 million."

[Randi]

It is SO sickening!! It's not that these people are starving, they simply do it money. Argghhh!!! I really hope it will stop!!

[caseysmom]

Thats disgusting and I was shocked to see its in Canada.

[Cataholic]

Sealers and the Fisheries Department defend the hunt as sustainable, humane and well-managed and say it provides supplemental income for isolated fishing communities that have been hurt by the decline in cod stocks.

Just like the beef industry said here, UNTIL it the inhumane treatment was caught on tape.

Shame on the seal clubbers. Shame on them.

[Cinder & Smoke]

Canada tries the "See no evil ..." approach.

From a HSUS email sent out today >>>

Just before dawn this morning, the annual hunt for baby seals began in Canada.

Over the next few weeks, 275,000 harp seals will be brutally clubbed or shot for their fur. Incredibly, though,
many people believe that Canada ended this hunt in the 1980s. But it's still happening, right now.
That's why the sealers don't want us here -- with our cameras rolling.

For four years, The Humane Society of the United States' ProtectSeals team has stood its ground
as Canada's extraordinary harp seal nurseries are transformed each spring into bloody killing fields.
The sealers have rammed our cars, smashed our boats, and brandished the very same clubs that
they use to kill baby seals -- all in a vain attempt to intimidate us.

Then yesterday, Canada’s government took an unprecedented step:
It refused to issue hunt observation permits to our team -- and to journalists -
- in time for us to document the slaughter this morning. This means that sealers,
if they have reached the seals by now, are killing baby seals without witnesses.
Which is exactly what they want.

[lizbud]

I don't think that every animal rights group will stay away. I hope a
few show up anyway & expose their horrible practice. If they feel that
guilty, they shouldn't allow the killing.

[lizbud]

If anyone wants to learn more about this annual killing,check out the
HSUS website. There is a daily count.


http://www.hsus.org/index-seals.html

[Argranade]

I wish I could donate ALLOT of money to help them.

I'm glad no one is giving up, I've signed allot of petitions.

I'm embarrsed of Canada, our native land is doing this horrible act.

I hope it stops SOON!

As for those 4 sealers drowning a few weeks ago, I have no pity for them.

[Catty1]

http://cfcn.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNe..._hunter_080404

Angry fishermen chase seal hunt protesters

Canadians, sealers appeal to EU not to impose ban
Minister says seal hunt protesters to be charged
Bodies of sealers return home, joint funeral set

The Canadian Press

Fri. April. 4 2008 12:43 PM ET

ST-PIERRE — A militant environmental group opposed to the East Coast seal hunt was forced to flee the French islands of St-Pierre-Miquelon on Friday after angry fishermen cut the mooring lines of the group's flagship vessel.

The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society sparked outrage earlier this week when the group's leader, Paul Watson, said the recent deaths of three seal hunters north of Cape Breton was a tragedy, but the continued slaughter of seal pups "is an even greater tragedy.''

On Friday, Watson's vessel, the Farley Mowat, was confronted at the wharf by two dozen residents of St-Pierre, the capital of the French territory south of Newfoundland.

Police said the ship left after its lines were cut with axes, following a confrontation between the activists and the fishermen.

Fisherman Carl Beaupertuis, 47, says when he heard Watson's comments about sealers he was deeply angered.

"We cut the ropes ... because the fishermen of St-Pierre don't accept what Paul Watson said,'' he said.

"He's not allowed to come in the harbour any more. It's finished for him.''

Watson later confirmed that he had left St-Pierre-Miquelon after the mooring lines were cut.

The vessel will return to the Gulf of St. Lawrence and intends to continue monitoring the seal hunt in that region and off the coast of Labrador, he said.

Watson said that a member of his crew filmed the incident on St. Pierre and he may bring a formal complaint before the French courts.

"That's a possibility. We'll have to look into that. We definitely have it documented,'' said Watson.

"I had the cameras rolling, so we did identify the individuals.''

Andre Varcin, a senior official with the French government, said it would be up to the local prosecutor's office to decide if any charges are warranted against the fishermen.

Federal Fisheries Minister Loyola Hearn has said Watson's group will be charged with allegedly getting too close to the seal hunt last weekend.

Watson said he doesn't intend to dock his vessel at any Canadian harbours, adding that the Farley Mowat has enough fuel and food to last for months before returning to its home port in Rotterdam in the Netherlands.

Meanwhile, a patrol aircraft and two icebreakers searched north of Cape Breton on Friday for the body of a missing seal hunter.

The coast guard is also looking for a trawler from Iles-de-la-Madeleine, Que., that capsized and sank last weekend with the sealer and five other hunters aboard. Two men survived the capsizing.

The search was ordered by Hearn after complaints that the coast guard had given up its search for Carl Aucoin too soon.

As well, the Transportation Safety Board has said it needs to examine the 12-metre L'Acadien II, which struck a truck-size chunk of ice and capsized last Saturday while in tow behind the icebreaker Sir William Alexander.

Meanwhile, the coast guard's second-heaviest icebreaker, the Terry Fox, was expected to join the search Friday.

Once the trawler is found, Canadian Forces divers will help with the recovery, the Fisheries Department confirmed.

In Iles-de-la-Madeleine, a chain of islands north of P.E.I., many residents were expected take part in a public visitation for the three men whose bodies were recovered from L'Acadien II on the same day it overturned.

Funerals for captain Bruno Bourque and crew members Gilles Leblanc and Marc-Andre Deraspe are to be held Saturday on the chain of islands north of Prince Edward Island.

Two seal hunters -- Claude Deraspe and Bourque's son, Bruno-Pierre -- survived the sinking.

[Catty1]

JMO - until this is illegal - which it should be - these men and their bereaved families are not criminals.

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/0...ealers_account

Capsized sealers give chilling account of accident, fight for survival

Wed Apr 2, 9:34 PM

By Andy Blatchford And Les Perreaux, The Canadian Press


ILES-DE-LA-MADELEINE, Que. - Claude Deraspe was naked and clinging to a piece of ice in the North Atlantic when he noted with grim satisfaction that his bone-chilling escape from L'Acadien II had accomplished at least one thing.

"Now if I die," he thought to himself, "my body will be found."

Deraspe and crewmate Bruno-Pierre Bourque were the only two survivors from the six-man crew of the sealing vessel that capsized last Saturday while under tow by the Canadian Coast Guard.


Seal hunter Bruno-Pierre Bourque listens to a question during a news conference in les Iles-de-la-Madeleine, Que. on Wednesday April 2, 2008. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Marinel LeBlanc

The two young men gave a detailed account Wednesday of their escape from the boat that rammed into ice, overturned and filled with water within seconds.

Three men died, and the Canadian government promised Wednesday to resume the search for the fourth man lost at sea, Carl Aucoin.

The accident happened in the dark hours of Saturday morning while boat captain Bruno Bourque and sealers Gilles Leblanc and Marc-Andre Deraspe snored away in their bunks.

Deraspe decided to retire too, leaving Bruno-Pierre Bourque, the captain's son, at the helm of the L'Acadien II, with its disabled rudder. Aucoin was on watch.

The sky was full of stars and the wind was calm, Bruno-Pierre Bourque recalled.

The uneventful tow from the coast guard icebreaker Sir William Alexander ended when the big ship swerved to dodge a massive chunk of ice in the otherwise relatively clear waters.

The ice-cake ended up directly in the path of L'Acadien II.

"The boat hit the chunk of ice and that flipped us instantly," Bourque said.

"The icebreaker continued to pull."

Down below, the boat jolted to a halt with the sound of moorings snapping off, Deraspe said.

Within seconds Aucoin yelled that water was rushing into the cabin where all six men rested, manned the helm or kept watch.

"I got up and yelled, 'Get up! Get up!'," Deraspe told reporters in his hometown of Iles-de-la-Madeleine, Que.

"I clapped my hands to wake up Marco, Bruno and Gilles."

At the helm, Bourque heard Wayne Dickson, the captain of the nearby Madelinot War Lord, yelling over the radio for the Sir William Alexander to stop.

Water was already rushing in so fast that escape through the main door was impossible for Bourque and Aucoin. Water pushed them out a back exit instead.

"Everything happened very fast," Bourque said. "We're talking about 15 seconds."

Bourque found himself beneath the upside-down boat with debris on his back. He doesn't remember precisely how he escaped.

"I opened my eyes and I said to myself, 'There's no way you're going to stay trapped here'," he said.

"After that my memory is very hazy until I was pulled from the water beside the upside down boat."

Bourque does remember looking up to see the crew of the Madelinot War Lord pluck him from the icy water.

"I owe them my life," he said.

Down below in the capsized L'Acadien II, dressed in a T-shirt, shorts and wool socks, Deraspe tried to get out a door. Instead, the rushing water ripped off his clothes.

He returned to the cabin to get air. As the water level in the upside-down boat rose to his armpits, then his shoulders, then his neck, he stuck his nose upward.

"I put my lips to the ceiling, which was the floor of the boat, and I said to myself, 'Don't take in air until the water is up to your ears'," Deraspe recalled.

"I took a big breath and I thought, 'You have to leave, or you'll stay here forever."'

Deraspe couldn't find the door. He felt around until he struck a control lever, which told him the captain's window was nearby. With air running out, he opened the window, kicked a piece of ice out of the way and swam to the surface.

He was clinging to the hull of L'Acadien II when the thought struck him that he would be sucked down with the ship if it sank. So he swam to a small ice pack and crawled out of the water.

A few feet away, Wayne Dickson on the Madelinot War Lord spotted him.

"I heard Mr. Dickson yell, 'Come on boys! Come on boys! Another one here!'," Deraspe said.

It took six men several attempts to haul Deraspe's numb body out of the water. The crew wrapped him in a blanket.

"Bruno-Pierre was there," Deraspe said.

"What a comfort. I didn't know where anyone else was."

"Thanks to Wayne and his crew for saving our lives."

Dickson wishes he could have done more.

"I was just hoping that somebody was going to come up," he said.

Dickson became a gruff and outspoken critic of the coast guard tow and rescue attempt hours after the accident. On Wednesday, he described an eager female coast guard diver who wanted to go back into L'Acadien II for one last look for Aucoin's body.

Her superior would not allow it.

The Madelinot War Lord continued to search the area for hours after the initial rescues, but no one else surfaced. When they finally left the scene, the coast guard had cut L'Acadien II loose. The 12-metre boat still bobbed near the surface as he left.

"I feel so sorry, for those guys, that we couldn't save them all," said Dickson, choking back tears.