These people would not be allowed to crush the skulls of baby
seals if the Canadian government didn't permit it. Shame On
Canada for allowing this to go on.


About the Canadian Seal Hunt





©2005 Brian Skerry/HSUS
Seal hunters call them "beaters"—seal pups who are at least two weeks old. And once a baby seal starts to molt even a part of its white coat, the Canadian government allows hunters to beat the pups to death with a club or a large ice-pick-like hakapik. There have even been reports of sealers killing mothers who try to protect their unweaned pups.


Canadian government figures show that in 2002–2003 96.6% of the reported 286,238 seals killed between November 15 and May 15 were 12 days to 12 weeks old. Under the government's latest plan, hunters will be allowed to kill 975,000 harp seals on their home ice east of Newfoundland and Labrador during a three-year period. We don't know how many more seals were killed than were reported, but we do know that in the 2001-2002 hunt, sealers killed at least 30,000 more seals than allowed by law. And how did the Canadian government punish the sealers? By upping the quota.

The Canadian government has proven time and again that it is more interested in promoting a commercial seal hunt (a massive slaughter that is nothing like the traditional hunts of the past) than in the humane treatment of seals. When confronted with evidence from an independent, international team of veterinarians that regulations on the treatment of the seals were not being obeyed—that up to 40% of seal pups were being skinned while alive and conscious—the government refused to crack down on sealers.

Some, in fact, might say the government tacitly rewarded the sealers by subsidizing the hunt to the tune of $20 million between 1995 and 2001. And right this minute, it's promoting seal fur, meat, and oil all over the world.

One way the Canadian government justifies its support of the seal hunt is to claim that seals in the North Atlantic eat too many cod. But there's no good scientific support for this claim. In fact, two of the government's own scientists reported in 1994 that the true cause of cod depletion in the North Atlantic was over-fishing.

Ecosystems are complex—seals also eat cod predators (other fish), for example, so removing seals might even worsen the cod stock's condition. But it's more convenient for the government and fishing industry to scapegoat seals than it is for them to address the serious problem of over-fishing.