Every year around this time, the media is flooded with images of helpless baby seals, and of ice floes stained red with their blood, during the annual Canadian seal hunt, a source of a controversy that has raged for many years between the Canadian government and environmentalists around the world. This year, the quota for the Canadian seal hunt has been set at 468,000, signaling the imminent deaths of almost half a million harp, hooded and grey seals. The sheer scale of Canada’s seal hunt triggers global outrage every year, and yet few people know that seal slaughters happen elsewhere, too, albeit on a much smaller scale.
In the United Kingdom, humans historically hunted seals for their meat and fur. However, a practice that was once sustainable became increasingly less so as human populations expanded and seals were killed to meet the demands of the commercial fur trade. By the beginning of the 20th century, Scottish grey seal populations had collapsed so severely that the species was on the brink of extinction, and the U.K.’s other seal species, the common seal, was not faring much better. In light of this, the British government passed the Conservation of Seals Act in 1970. The law prohibited the killing of all seal species within the U.K., but came with a caveat that allowed “the killing or attempted killing of any seal to prevent it from causing damage to a fishing net or fishing tackle…or to any fish for the time being in such fishing net.”
For many years, this loophole allowed members of the fishing, salmon angling and aquaculture industries to kill seals with impunity in the belief that the animals were responsible for dwindling fish stocks. In response to mounting pressure from conservationists, however, Scotland passed a second act in 2010, known as the Marine Scotland Act. This Act decreed that members of the fishing community would have to apply for a license to kill seals in order to “protect the health and welfare of farmed fish,” or to “prevent serious damage to fisheries or fish farms.” The Act also allowed the provision of licenses for the killing or taking of seals for a variety of other reasons, including for scientific research, and to prevent the spread of disease among seals or other animals. In 2011, the first year that the Act was implemented, licenses were given for the killing of 1,339 grey and common seals. According to the Scottish government, this quota has decreased steadily in the years since. This year, there were applications for 53 licenses by the end of January, 51 of which were granted. The total number of seals authorized to be killed by these licenses in 2015 amounts to 859 individuals, 662 of which are grey seals.
According to government figures, only a proportion of the seals specified by annual quotas are actually shot (approximately a third). Official records show that between 2011 and 2014, a total of 1,371 grey and common seals were killed in Scottish waters. The quotas for 2015 represent 0.7 percent of the total grey seal population in Scotland, and 1 percent of the total common seal population, a proportion that the government claims is sustainable according to research carried out by the Sea Mammal Research Unit. However, conservationists believe that the official records touted by the Scottish government represent only a small number of the true seal killings throughout the United Kingdom each year. The figures are not independently verified, depending rather upon the honesty of license-holders. Outside Scotland, the original terms of the 1970 Conservation of Seals Act still apply, meaning that fishermen in England and Wales can still kill seals without a license if they are deemed to be a threat to their industry.
According to Andy Ottaway, the director of the Seal Protection Action Group, the fact that seals can be shot year-round under the terms of the licenses may result in a high toll of indirect seal deaths. Ottaway points out that for those seals shot during breeding season, “there is a high probability you’re shooting mothers. A quarter to half of them will be with pups.” These pups depend upon their mothers for food, and without them will soon starve.
Conservationists also question the necessity of killing the seals in the first place. The Scottish salmon industry, which produces 155,000 tons of farmed fish each year and has an annual export of more than $425 million (£285 million), claims that the seals are a threat to the nation’s fisheries. In reality, the commercial fish species targeted and farmed by these industries make up just a tiny percentage of grey and common seals’ natural diet. The decrease in fisheries’ productivity is far more likely to be a result of human overfishing. Much of the killing takes place in secluded coves away from the public eye, which is why seal deaths in the U.K. receive just a fraction of the media coverage of larger and more famous hunts.
When asked about the licensing initiative, a spokesman for the Scottish government said, “Scottish seals are now better protected than ever before. Since 2011 it has been illegal in Scotland to shoot a seal except as a last resort under strict licensing conditions.” However, seal protection groups argue that the shootings aren’t being used as a last resort in most instances. Instead, Ottaway claims that “the bullet is a cheap and permanent solution for those that dislike seals and blame them for the fish crashes caused by overfishing.” He believes that if fishermen and aquaculturists wanted to find a more humane method of dealing with their perceived seal problems, they could. Acoustic deterrents and double-layered anti-predator nets are effective together in keeping seals away from valuable fish farms. Unfortunately, although all Scottish fisheries do not apply for licenses to shoot seals, it’s difficult for conscientious consumers to determine which salmon products are guilt-free, particularly as approximately three-quarters of the farms that have applied for seal licenses are registered “Freedom Food” farms, meaning that they adhere humane husbandry practices.
The easiest way to protest the killing of seals in the U.K., therefore, is to boycott fish products unless you are sure of their origins. Fisheries respond to consumer pressure, as evidenced in 2014, when the Scottish Wild Salmon Company announced that it would no longer use firearms as a method of seal control, but would rely solely on acoustic deterrent devices. It was public outcry that made the Scottish government amend the 1970 Conservation of Seals Act by introducing licensing. Public outcry that also has the power to close the loopholes in the existing protective legislature. Sign the petition on the Seal Protection Action Group’s page, and if you must eat seafood, support only those fisheries that use humane seal-control methods.
