[Kobun]

How many have been hunting seals? (Not the Navy type) :neener:
What kind of a gun did you use?

Seals are supposed to be weary of your presense, so hunting them while in the water, you will need to give them a lobotomy, because if you hit them in the lungs, they will sink.

I might get the chance this year, but I'll have to get a suitable gun for it.
One that can take a bit of salt water wouldn't be a bad thing. :)

[Sunray]

"...weary of your presense..." Yes, they are wary of your presence. Everything in the Arctic eats them. Saw something somewhere, likely long, ago about the Inuit using .22 Hornets for seals. Our Canadian Rangers get to use the rifle they get issued from the CF to hunt with. They used .303's at one time and it seems to me I saw something about them still using the No. 4 because it's far more reliable than any FN or C7 in extreme cold.

[Selfdfenz]

Pardon me Gentlemen for asking what may be a silly question but what do you do with seals. Can they be eaten?
I assume that becasue seal skin (seal fur) was once used for garments (was it gloves??) that is still a possibility. Just wondering. Is the hair kept on or taken off to make some form of leather?

S-

[Skunkabilly]

A spiked club :evil:

[mete]

Yes they can , and I have eaten seal. Various garments can be made not just gloves - jackets etc . Inuit clothing often has the fur on the inside...The Inuit take head shots ,then the problem is to get the seal before it sinks. Canada is opening up seal hunting again, in large numbers, in hopes of reducing the number of seal that eat fish.

[Stand_Watie]

I want a sealskin coat for when I visit the folks up north.

I'd prefer a white one, they're supposed to be a lot softer, but I don't think the Canadians club the pups anymore:mad:

[Chuck Dye]

Long before the U.S. Marine Mammal Protection Act, I was treated to samples of seal (species unknown, may have been sea lion) and beluga whale. Tasty stuff. If memory serves, though, you should not eat the liver, it is so rich in vitamin A it is toxic. Don’t know what the LD-50 might be.

[Art Eatman]

Any coat made with the hair in is gonna be warmer than one made for purty, with the hair out. Dead air is an insulator, so hair-in means dead air and the hide is the windbreak.

Same deal for a wool lining of a tight-weave denim, or goose-down inside nylon.

Or glass wool inside the walls of a house, for that matter. Dead (unmoving) air.

:), Art

[Selfdfenz]

That's cool. We have animals here in Texas that have hides adaptable to clothing but seal is not something you might encounter food-wise.

It's interesting they sink. I guess I would have thought their body fat would have been enough to make then float.

Interesting but that is one of the reasons THR is such an interesting place. Never know what you might learn.

Good luck with the seal hunt.
S-

[Kobun]

Yes, you can eat the animal.
I think that only the best meat is used by those that eat them, and as mentioned, the liver might be toxic.
As for what you do with them:
-Shoot them (Target practice)
-Cut off their jaw and send it to a laberatory.
-Recieve check.

I have been told you get $70 for each jaw.
A little further north than where I live, there has been very little interest in the hunt, so when you get a permit, you can tag as many as you want.
I talked to a guy that planned to spend his summer with a friend hunting.
They can shoot up to 400 seals, giving them $28500 for their efforts.

The problems with seals is that they eat fish. Very much fish.
For several years the tree (and seal?) huggers got a ban on killing seals.
This has resulted in an explotion in the number, and this really taxes the fish population.
Look at it as shooting prairie dogs. Big BIG prairie dogs that swim. :D

[stevelyn]

Yes seal can be eaten. They are very good although I prefer the oil rather than the meat. The Inupiat and Yupik usually use .223s or other centerfire .22s.

The liver might be toxic.

The livers of most marine mammals have high levels of Vitamin A that can be lethal.

Mmmmmm..................beluga muktuk.:D

[Selfdfenz]

So hunting them is also 'resouce balancing.'

We have quiet a few deer herds in the US that would benefit from some balancing but you can't explain that to the city dwellers that feed Bambi in the back yard then wonder the following spring why the same Bambi is eating their bushes to the ground and costing them 5000$ when it runs into front of their Saab.

The closest we come down this way that I know of is the project in Louisiana to get ridd of nutrea. They pay a small fee for those brought in. Sadly, as I understand it, only residents of the state can participate.

It would be great recreation and benefits the wetlands greatly as these animals are supremely damaging to the ecosystem and ( I think) have no natural preditors to speak of in the way the do in SA where they come from.
The vitamin A thing is very interesting. Wonder they they accumutate it so.

Good luck guys and try not to fall out of the boat:D

S-

[HABU]

Hunting seals? In Washington we have MANY seals but are unable to stabilize the population. Major no no. I have seen one seal meet its demise on a rock, thanks to JMB. I'd like to relieve the state of some seals. They ruin beaches, steal your salmon off the end of your line and are a general nuisance at the marinas. Way over healthy population levels.

[Ardent]

Stand_Watie---> I truly hope you are joking or I have missinterpreted your point. Seal pup clubbing was a disgusting practice that I am ashamed to say some fellow Canadians participated in. It truly was disgraceful, unabashed rape and pilage of the environment, and I say this as a Canadian hunter and fisherman. I'm all for hunting, but lets include morals such as fair chase and decency. That's my small change.

Ardent

[Art Eatman]

Ardent, there are two parts to your view: First, the method; and second, the environmental aspects.

I'm not sure I see clubbing as bad. The purpose was for fur, so clubbing meant no bullet holes. Further, if a group of men is shooting, there is some danger to each other, and some chance of overpenetration into animals not intended for harvest.

Second, if the numbers taken did not reduce the viability of the species for continued survival, no environmental harm of consequence occured. Over-harvest, of course, is definitely a Bad Thing. As I understand it, the numbers were controlled by the Canadian Government; presumably the herds were vetted by wildlife biologists.

Seal pups are cute, but SFAIK the populations are stable. Fish aren't particularly cute, so there's little public outcry over the reduction of the Atlantic Giant Tuna to some 10% of its one-time numbers. There's little public outcry that the "good fish" such as cod and halibut are dramatically depleted and we now are sold what once were considered "trash fish".

If you're really concerned about "rape and pilage (sic)" of the environment, look to the fish populations, not the seals.

Art

[Selfdfenz]

"If you're really concerned about "rape and pilage (sic)" of the environment, look to the fish populations, not the seals."

X-ring Art. I've followed the downward trend in many world fisheres for decades. The recruitment numbers are depressing and scary. We (humans in general) have just about cleaned out some species. Too bad you can't fish farm cod, pollock etc.

S-

[Kobun]

Ardent, would you say the same thing about killing baby mice and rats at grain elevators?
It is calculated that seals eat something like $1 billion worht of fish along the Norwegian ocean.
I wonder what the number along the US Pasiffic is. Staggering I guess.
When you let one species take over, it eats and eats untill other species go extinct.
This is in none of our interests (nor seal nor man), but the seals don't heave the brain to see this, limit their own birthrate or start fishfarming themselves.
So, it is up to us. Eighter leave things alone, and have a seal population out of control that will empty the oceans, starve and get sick.
Or we can harvest what nature brings.
The white fur of baby seals were nice and soft, and very good for making gloves, but you don't see that anymore.

[Ardent]

You all have good points, however I stand by what I said. I am ashamed it took place. We as hunters would (hopefully) find clubbing fawns to death dispicable as well if it were practical. If you have ever seen seal pup clubbing happening on video or in person, you might feel how I do. It is enough to make you gag. Watching the mothers seals frantically trying to chase off the hunters as they close in and club the screaching seal pup to death. And frequently, the seal pups were not dead when they were skinned, only incapacitated. I don't know about you folks, but this just seems morally wrong to me. That said, I have no problem with seasonal (adult) seal hunting out of breeding season.

Another side of the coin:

I have done a fair bit of salmon fishing on the Pacific coast of Canada here where I live and have seen many half eaten salmon reeled in. Yes, it is frustrating, but I remind myself the seals were here long before we were. It seems too often we step into nature's course and muck it up although we mean well. Like the Australian toad epidemic, killer bees, and non native species introduction worldwide. Granted, we have copius numbers of seals on the west coast. To me however that doesn't mean a mass slaughter to put the population in check is warranted. Nature is self regulating, at a point when fish populatiuons drop too low, so will seal numbers. It is the cycle of life.

In closing, as for managed hunting, I'm all for it, but I think I've made clear why I have a problem with pup clubbing.

Ardent

[Art Eatman]

"Harvesting" the fur seal pups by clubbing has nothing to do with hunting. It's purely a commercial venture.

As far as the "brutality" of clubbing, I see it as no different from slaughtering cattle by the use of a sledge-hammer between the eyes at Swift or Armour&Co. When I was a kid, if we were to have chicken for dinner I'd catch a chicken and take an axe and chop off the head. I'd jump back and watch the headless chicken run and flutter and spray blood in all directions.

Since people first figured the method, millenia ago, hogs have been slaughtered by hanging them from the hind legs and cutting the aorta. Lots of squealing and lots of blood, as the heart exsanguinates the body. The meat is cleaner, that way.

As I've aged and learned, I've come to the belief that whether or how any one animal gets killed is relatively unimportant, outside the arena of what's commonly called "sport hunting". What's most important is that that animal's species be healthy.

Sport hunting involves all the stuff about ethics and clean kill that we've quite often talked about here. I don't want to get into that in this thread.

I have no personal knowledge of the relative populations of seals and fish around Norway. I'm assuming Kobun's knowledge and commentary are based on reports from their wildlife/fisheries biologists. If the "mass Killing" actually creates a more proper balance, I have no problem. Certainly I don't have any facts to use in argument against the program.

Sometimes peoples' use of various aspects of nature create improper situations, and it's merely exercising responsibility to undo the damage. Sometimes that which is required is non particularly pleasing. It can be over-harvest of fish or animals or timber; or over-grazing on ranches and "burnout" of farmlands...

Art

[Ardent]

Duly noted, your distinction between harvesting and sport hunting is quite appropriate. I'm deffinately not trying to say you or anyone else is wrong, for me however it is a moral issue.

Ardent

[NRA4LIFE]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A20625-2004Apr17.html

In case anybody was unaware, the harp seal clubbing is alive and well. They are not allowed, however, to take the white babies. They must wait to club them until they are about 13 days old.

[Stand_Watie]

You're perfectly welcome to your opinion Ardent, but no, I wasn't joking. I've seen video of seals being clubbed and find it no more morally offensive than killing any other animal.

A hard smack between the eyes is no crueler than a bullet.

If killing seals, or killing baby seals is environmentally unsound, then it shouldn't be done, but I utterly reject your morals of "fair chase" or "decency" in hunting. I support hunting primarily for food, clothing, varmint control or financial gain. Sport is a reasonable secondary consideration, but is irrelevant to my morality.

Introducing a grossly subjective moral judgement like decency into the argument is playing right into the anti-hunters hands.

Cows and deer have big beautiful brown eyes as well, but I have no problem with eating beef or venison.

[Leaky Waders]

Here, in mississippi, beaver have a bounty on the tails...you wack them and turn the tail in for a profit.

As for baby seals and stuff...I don't like it either. I'm not judging anyone...I just don't like it personally. I know, intellectually, that it's not much different from a slaughter-house. But, there's no fair chase in it. I don't know - it just seems kind of wrong to me.

It's kind of like shooting a baby elephant or fawn or baby racoon or something. Where's the sport in it?

Didn't they hunt Dodo birds with clubs too? Of course they weren't as proliphic as the seals apparently seem to be.

Like most of you know, I enjoy hunting - mainly waterfowl and upland game. The seal pup thing to me isn't really hunting...it's more of a harvest.

L.W.

[Stand_Watie]

As for baby seals and stuff...I don't like it either. I'm not judging anyone...I just don't like it personally. I know, intellectually, that it's not much different from a slaughter-house. But, there's no fair chase in it. I don't know - it just seems kind of wrong to me. It's kind of like shooting a baby elephant or fawn or baby racoon or something. Where's the sport in it?

God or evolution, whichever you prefer, gave us a squeamish factor that helps most people in rearing their offspring. I think that is where your 'it just seems kind of wrong' feelings come from.

Provided of course that they either need killing, or that killing them is environmentally neutral I have no problem with killing baby elephants, fawns or racoons if it's done for food, clothing, varmint control or profit.

I've eaten road killed fawn. Not as tender as veal, but better than any other venison I've had.

[Art Eatman]

An important thing in discussions like this is to NOT lump stuff together. We gotta keep stuff specific to each part of the deal.

Some of it has to do with species numbers. Some of it has to do with the difference between hunting and harvesting. Some of it has to do with the ethics of fair chase.

And we gotta be careful about analogies. What was done to the dodo was wrong. Species extinction and all that. I don't see how that can be compared to any sort of killing where there are controls as to numbers and methods.

The seals are being harvested for their fur. It is not at all "hunting".

Certain species are pests, and are killed to prevent or reduce damages, etc. The most obvious is the rat, but as mentioned the beaver can be a problem in some places. In others, it's the nutria.

Think, dang it! Think!

:), Art

[Stand_Watie]

The seals are being harvested for their fur. It is not at all "hunting".
Certain species are pests, and are killed to prevent or reduce damages, etc. The most obvious is the rat, but as mentioned the beaver can be a problem in some places. In others, it's the nutria.

Well that depends upon your definition of hunting I think. I think of hunting as the killing of any wild animal, rather than the narrower definition of killing the animals for "sport".

I don't frown upon killing animals for sport, if it's environmentally neutral or positive, but I think that restricting the definition of hunting to that construct plays into the anti-hunting agenda.

To me, the guy who hunts deer primarily to put venison on his table is no different than a commercial fisherman, or a fur trapper.

The guy who hunts prairie dogs for the challenge of hitting a very small target at 500 yards has every right to do so, in my thinking (provided prairie dogs aren't endangered), but limiting the definition of 'hunting' to his type of 'sport' makes it all too easy for the anti-hunter to claim any particular type of hunting is too easy and is therefore immoral as it doesn't allow "fair chase". In 50 years they'll have us hunting deer only with spears using that logic, and then there will be so few people left "hunting" that banning it altogether will be practical and easy for them to pull off.

[Leaky Waders]

To me and most hunters the difference in hunting and harvesting is the fair chase...regardless if its for sport, pelt, or fur.

Trapping mice in your house is not hunting. Mc Donald's killing their crop of chickens to produce nuggets is not hunting. Clubbing baby seals for the cash crop of fur is not hunting. Banging bovines on their heads for steaks is not hunting. Butchering pigs on a farm is not hunting.

Some seem to be less bothersome on the soul than others...but none are hunting. Like I said, I'm not going to judge the person for doing the clubbing or wearing the clubbed little whelp...but I won't do it or support it financially. I wouldn't protest it either. I'd just let my moral compass guide me through the landmines.

To stray a bit ;) Art got me to thinking about last year as my two sons and I were walking through the woods on the way back from a squirrel hunt. We didn't shoot any that particular day. A very young oppossum ran across the firelane and climbed to the tip of a sappling about eye level with my head...that's as far as the little bitty tree grew. Well, there we were, eye to eye. My double barrel 20 gauge was loaded w/ #6 shot . My eldest son's automatic was loaded with the same.

The youngest, my then 7 year old asked, "Aren't you going to shoot it daddy?"

My oldest (11 years old), exclaimed "No!"

My youngest asked "Why?"

My oldest said, "Because we are squirrel hunting. Not 'possum hunting."

I was very proud that day. My eleven year old got it. Hunting, to me anyways isn't going through the woods serial killing every animal of opportunity. Part of hunting is respecting nature. I don't feel that bashing baby seals is very respectful.

Just my opinion,
L.W.

[Stand_Watie]

I was very proud that day. My eleven year old got it. Hunting, to me anyways isn't going through the woods serial killing every animal of opportunity. Part of hunting is respecting nature. I don't feel that bashing baby seals is very respectful

And of course it's you're right to feel that way. I feel that your definition of "hunting" is a very narrow definition, easily legislated away with artificial constructs of moral compasses and "fair chase".

I, for one, feel that if you'd have had a reason to kill the opossum, it would have been well within the scope of hunting for you to do so, regardless of your intent when you'd began the hunt. You're intent to kill squirrels for your pleasure is no different to me than your feeling about other people "serial killing every animal of opportunity" is to you. I don't hunt for sport, but I don't begrudge you the opportunity.

[H&Hhunter]

I don't hunt for sport, but I don't begrudge you the opportunity.

Stand,

I beg to differ with you. Each and every one of us on this board who hunt are sport hunters. Unless you are forced to hunt for survival your hunting is for sport. You can go to the grocery store and buy your food or your jacket. Therefore you choose to hunt. There are very few substinance hunters left in this world and none of them have the means to post on this web site.

We hunt becuase we choose to. We hunt because we enjoy it. We hunt because we are real people who do not deny our genetic make up and instinctual, emoitional need to hunt. That makes us all sport hunters, and thank god for it!!

If you hunt for food when you have the easier and less expensive option of growing it or buying it you are a sport hunter.

[Stand_Watie]

If you hunt for food when you have the easier and less expensive option of growing it or buying it you are a sport hunter.

That may very well be the case of most hunters. And I don't begrudge them that right or opportunity, but that is not the case for me.

I also disagree with your assertion that other than "being forced" to hunt for survival all hunting is for "sport". My "hunting" is largely limited to varmit control and trapping hogs (although I certainly wouldn't pass up a deer if it presented itself), and is predominately pragmatic rather than pleasurable.

Although I gain pleasure from a hundreds of lbs of free pork in my freezer, walks in the woods with my daughter, or teaching her to shoot and to be responsible with firearms, not to mention the hard facts of life, my gains are tangible, my rewards greater than my outlays, and I will never reduce it to the status of a "sport".

[H&Hhunter]

Although I gain pleasure from a hundreds of lbs of free pork in my freezer, walks in the woods with my daughter, or teaching her to shoot and to be responsible with firearms, not to mention the hard facts of life, my gains are tangible, my rewards greater than my outlays, and I will never reduce it to the status of a "sport".

I agree with your statement as this is far more to me than a "sport". It is a way of life.

However I have a very hard time when hunters segragate other hunters by labeling them. The labels are the following catagories "just a sport hunter", "Damn trophy hunter", "Meat hunter", "just a trapper", "bowhunter''. bow hunters often hate "Muzzel loader hunters" and Muzzel loader hunters hate those "G.D. Rifle hunters" who all hate "Houndsmen" who can't stand those "out of staters" Moslty "Frickin Texans" who are "Road hunters" who (I actually heard this last week can't stand them darn "Hippie hiker hunters" So on and so forth.

United we stand divided we attend PETA meeting and talk about what a great guy Castro really is while listening to Diane Finstien lecturing on the social accpetance of hating W.H.A.M.S. and superiority of Kerry for ruler.

Just a thought....

[Stand_Watie]

United we stand divided we attend PETA meeting and talk about what a great guy Castro really is while listening to Diane Finstien lecturing on the social accpetance of hating W.H.A.M.S. and superiority of Kerry for ruler.Just a thought....

I couldn't possibly agree with this statement more. That is why I am so adamant about hunting being more than just "sport". I don't at all denigrate the sport aspect of hunting, or hunters who hunt primarily for sport, I just feel that reducing it to sport allows the anti hunters an avenue of attack that could wind up depriving us all of what is a right. If they can claim "sporting fair chase" they will eventually legislate away all hunting rights.

Hunting is NOT the same thing as golfing. It may incorporate some of the same good qualities, but golf will only be here as long as it is not considered a hazard to society, and is dependant upon the good will of the majority. Hunting should be here as a right for the minority rather than a priviledge served at the whim of the majority.

P.S. You may have noticed that the name I chose for my moniker on this forum is that of a famous American Indian. Even though I'm (genetically speaking) pretty much a standard white american I chose that moniker as a little tribute to the great influence native Indians had to the formation of the society we now call America. One of the greatest contributions we now enjoy today is the right to hunt. Almost every state constitution from the early days of the republic included a right to hunt. A right not enjoyed by most european settlers when they left the shores on the other side of the atlantic. American Indians imparted upon our forefathers the importance of hunting as subsistence and as heritage, rather than just the "sport" aspect of it that was known to the Puritans in 1621 when they were first stepping foot on the "new world".

[Leaky Waders]

"I, for one, feel that if you'd have had a reason to kill the opossum, it would have been well within the scope of hunting for you to do so, regardless of your intent when you'd began the hunt. You're intent to kill squirrels for your pleasure is no different to me than your feeling about other people "serial killing every animal of opportunity" is to you. I don't hunt for sport, but I don't begrudge you the opportunity."

Ahh but there's the rub...see if my 11 year old son is disciplined enough to hunt the animal that he strives for, and respects the other animals in and out of the woods, then he is more likely to find the animal that he is hunting for.

The 'serial killers' who walk the woods often smack the first blue jay they see...just because they can. It's not legal being a song bird and all. They aren't going to use the bird in any way or form...they just smack it because they feel entitled to do so. A might makes right Kant philosophy. Then afterwards they ponder why they never saw the deer they were hunting after unloading their rounds in a can, possum or whatever.

Others, such as in Stand's example, shoot the opportunistic deer. They aren't a deer hunter. They can't go out season after season and bring home a trophy. They just get lucky on the way to doing something else and make the shot. Killing a deer with an automobile isn't hunting either...

There is hunting and there is killing. Chasing a free-roaming lion and shooting it or shooting a lion at Busch Gardens both results in a dead lion...but one was hunted, given the opportunity to escape the situation, the other was not.

I think 'that' is the main difference in your situation involving the seals. Hunting an adult seal that can escape is hunting. Bashing a bunch of immature seals on the head that have no means of escape or defense is a harvest (if you're going to use their fur) or pest control (if you're going to save a fishery).

Neither are inherently evil. But, they are entirely different things. When you lump the killing of animals for a harvest in with the average hunter with a different code of ethics, then you're bound to have some divisiveness.

V/R,
L.W.

[H&Hhunter]

Stand,

Fundamentally we are in total agreement. We're just hung up on some terminology..:)

[Stand_Watie]

Fair enough H&H:D

[Art Eatman]

FWIW, I've trapped, I've hunted with "bonearrer" and guns, and I've done a serious deer-herd-reduction thing as part of a habitat protection/restoration project. I never considered the reduction effort as being hunting in what I think is the classic meaning of the word--with or without the adjective "sport".

I used the term "sport hunting" much as does H&H. (It seems to me that the degree of passion is irrelevant.) The seal killing isn't hunting, to me; it's a harvest for a commercial purpose.

So let's sorta give some thought to the semantics issue, to what folks are trying to mean. Since we don't have body language and facial expressions to help, we're stuck with just the printed word. IMO, it's pretty obvious there's a terminology problem...

:), Art

[sitkablacktail]

Seal liver wrapped in bacon mmmmmmmmm, .223 right between the eyes, but I'm white so what do I know. Seal oil and dried salmon, yuk, it's an aquried taste. You Norway boys got it made. Ahh seal steaks roasted over the open fire just a dream.:what:

[Harry Tuttle]

What? don'tcha read yer National Geographics no more?

http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0403/feature3/index.html

http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0403/feature3/images/zm_zoomin.3.6.jpg

The Chill of the Hunt
Photograph by Brian Skerry

There's little physical friction these days out on the ice, where a hunter drags a dead seal to a boat. In years past, animal-welfare activists sparred with hunters over the killing of whitecoat pups. The activists prevailed: In 1983 the European Economic Community banned importation of the fur, and in 1987 Canada outlawed commercial hunting of pups. Now the Canadian government allows the harvesting of weaned and molted seals within established quotas, totalling 975,000 for the years 2003 to 2005.


>>>>>>>>>>

Today the fishing industry makes up 80 percent of the islands' economy. A thousand of the 13,000 islanders fish for a living, and a similar number process the catches of lobster, crab, herring, and mackerel.

Madelinot fishermen also remember the two decades of tribulation that began in the 1960s when antihunt campaigners, spearheaded by the International Fund for Animal Welfare and later by Greenpeace, triggered the eventual collapse of the seal trade. Portrayed as murderers and barbarians, fishermen suffered the contempt of the masses as television brought graphic scenes from the ice fields of the North Atlantic into the living rooms of Europe and North America.
_
Taking part in what had been known as the greatest hunt in the world—an enterprise that in the 19th century had involved more than 13,000 men and 400 sailing ships—was no longer a matter of pride but a mark of shame. Once hailed as "Vikings of the ice," the sealers were now the scum of the earth. The Madelinots' cries of Nous ne sommes pas des bouchers! —We are not butchers!—sounded hollow when accompanied by photographs of upraised clubs and bloodstained ice.
_
Jocelyn Thériault was a youngster when the protests peaked. Now 34, he owns a one-third share in a 65-foot (20-meter) fishing boat, Manon Yvon. He, his brother, and a cousin fish for snow crab and redfish. They used to fish for cod, too, but in April 2003 the North Atlantic cod fishery, which had failed to recover despite closures and dramatically reduced harvests, was shut down indefinitely by the Canadian government.
_
The demise of the cod industry has given renewed purpose to modern-day harp seal hunters: The livelihood of fishermen like Thériault depends on harvesting whatever the sea has to offer—including seals. Since 1987, when Canada outlawed commercial hunting for whitecoat pups, the main focus of the hunt has been molted pups known as beaters—so named because they tend to thrash the water when they swim, not because the traditional method of killing them is with clubs. Today beater pelts can be worth 40 Canadian dollars or more to a hunter.
_
I meet Thériault at the wharf in Cap-aux-Meules, the commercial center of the islands. He and his crew are loading supplies for the seal hunt, set to begin in a couple of days, ice permitting. Like all fishermen in this region, he can fish only eight months of the year because the coast is icebound through the winter. When he can't fish, he collects unemployment. With a 1.5-million-dollar boat to pay off, four months is a long time without significant income—and a long time to be ashore if your life is the sea.