Expedition to Seal Nursery Spotlights Pups Slated for Slaughter

February 29, 2008

By Rebecca Aldworth
Just days ago, The Humane Society of the United States returned from one of the most brutal seal hunts we have ever witnessed—the slaughter of baby grey seals in a protected nature reserve off Nova Scotia. What we saw was horrific, and a haunting reminder of what's to come just weeks from now, when Canada's much larger commercial hunt for harp seals begins in earnest.
Today, we leave again on a bittersweet expedition. We are making our annual trip to the ice floes to film the spectacular harp seal nursery before the commercial seal hunt starts.

Each winter, mother harp seals migrate to the sea ice off Canada's east coast, giving birth to their pups in early March. The harp seal nursery that forms is one of the most breathtaking wilderness scenes on earth.

Grey and Harp Seals

Both grey and harp seals—named for the harp-shaped markings on the backs of the adults—are intensely social mammals, gathering in groups to give birth and nurse along the Atlantic coast of Canada.

Grey seals (who can live up to 46 years old) were nearly wiped out in eastern Canada in the last century and they have only just recovered.

Now, both grey and harp seal pups are shot and clubbed to death for their fur. Each year, hundreds of thousands of the gentle harp seals are killed in Canada's infamous commercial seal hunt.