Update on sealing in Canada and Namibia
An Animal Rights Article from All-Creatures.org

FROM

HarpSeals.org
November 2017 

The massacres of harp seals in Canada and Cape fur seals in Namibia are over this year.

Almost 81,000 harp seal pups were killed in Canada (not including seals who were "struck and lost"). Each one wanted to live just as much as the sealer who killed him/her.

Tens of thousands of Cape fur seal pups were killed in their breeding colonies in Namibia. We continue to try to find out whether clubbers killed the full quota of 80,000 Cape fur seal pups.

Seal Meat


Seal flesh. Photo: Canadian Press

The latest efforts by sealers to make sealing acceptable to the Canadian public involve collaboration with chefs to bring seal flesh into restaurants. A handful of restaurants in Canada have served seal flesh, working very hard to make it palatable to the average Canadian. But that is a losing battle. Seal flesh will never be in vogue.

Seals vs. Cod

The Canadian government has long pushed the idea that harp seals are bad for the cod population. Whether they blamed seals for their own fisheries management failures that led to the collapse of the cod population or blamed them for keeping the cod population from recovering, harp seals have been a favorite scapegoat of the Canadian government for years.

Atlantic cod

Unlikely whistleblowers are exposing the truth of the government's mismanagement of the cod fishery now: fishermen. Some fishermen are criticizing the government for allowing draggers to catch cod despite the poor status of the codpopulation. "DFO hasn’t learned from past mistakes." If the cod fishery collapses again, you can be sure who will get the blame... the seals, not humans.

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