Humane World for Animals

You can save the seals!

Right now, thousands of baby seals are dying as climate change destroys their sea ice habitat. Unbelievably, the Canadian sealing industry wants to slaughter the survivors.

Climate change has caused the lowest sea ice formations in recorded history off Canada’s East Coast. For seals who give birth on the small fragile ice floes, this is a disaster. Despite this, Canadian government and sealing industry representatives have suggested that the annual seal kill level in Atlantic Canada should be in the hundreds of thousands.

This year, tens of thousands of seal pups—having already survived the destruction of their sea ice habitat—will be shot at and clubbed for their fur. Others—some likely while still conscious—will be impaled on metal hooks, dragged onto bloody boat decks, and beaten to death.

Please urge the next administration to take a fresh approach and work to end the commercial seal hunt once and for all.

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Right now, we are witnessing a climate disaster unfolding off Canada’s East Coast, as warming temperatures quickly diminish the sea ice that forms there each year. Many species of fish, sea birds and marine mammals are dependent upon this sea ice, including the harp seals targeted in Canada’s commercial seal hunt.  

Harp seals are utterly reliant on sea ice to give birth to and nurse their pups—but in recent years, we have witnessed the lowest sea ice formations off Canada’s East Coast in recorded history. Mother seals are struggling to find solid sea ice to give birth on, and, when the ice melts too soon, newborn pups are being forced into the water before they are strong enough to survive there. In bad ice years, government scientists have estimated up to 100% mortality of seal pups born in key whelping regions. In 2023, the Canadian government finally acknowledged the worrying impacts of vanishing sea ice on harp seals, slashing its population estimate by nearly half.

Climate change is also making commercial seal killing methods even more inhumane. With the ice often too fragile to stand on, sealers are increasingly resorting to distance shooting at seals near or in open water. Many wounded pups escape beneath the ice, where they die slowly. Others are impaled on metal hooks while conscious and dragged onto bloody boat decks to be beaten to death.  

It is unthinkable that the Canadian government has refused to take action to protect harp seals. Instead, the government seems intent on expanding commercial sealing, by providing industry subsidies and supporting the recruitment of a new generation of seal hunters. Government and sealing industry representatives have repeatedly called for a return to industrial-scale sealing in the hundreds of thousands annually, while pressing the government to establish new markets for seal products. Make no mistake, such a move would threaten the future survival of the harp seal population.  

More than 38 countries have taken action to protect seals, prohibiting trade in seal products and/or hunting of seals. It is time the Canadian government took a fresh approach on this issue and followed suit.  

I urge the new administration to protect seals now and transition those involved in the industry to sustainable, humane livelihoods that can bring in far more revenues to coastal communities than sealing ever could. This includes marine ecotourism, a woefully underdeveloped sector in Canada that holds significant potential to rejuvenate coastal communities.

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