This is a re-post from the Humane Society of the United States.
WELCOME TO THE WORLD
The annual Canadian Harp Seal hunt is underway beginning in April. It's by far the largest mammal hunt in the world and the only commercial hunt in which the target is the infant of it's species. For 6 to 8 weeks each spring, the ice floes of the Gulf of St. Lawrence and the eastern coast of Newfoundland and Labrador turn bloody, as some 300,000 harp seal pups, virtually all between the ages of 2 and 12 weeks old, are beaten to death - their skulls crushed with a heavy club called a hakapik - or shot. They are then skinned on the ice or in nearby hunting vessels after being dragged to the ships with boat hooks. The skinined carcasses are usually left on the ice or tossed in the ocean.
Thousands of other wounded pups (estimates range from 15,000 to 150,000 per year) manage to escape the hunters but die later of their injuries or drown after falling off the ice (pups younger than 5 weeks cannot swim). The seals are hunted chiefly for their pelts, which are exported to NORWAY, FINLAND, HONG KONG, TURKEY, RUSSIA and other countries, where they are used to make expensive designer-label coats and accessories. (Gucci, Prada, Versace)
To Sign the Pledge to Boycott Canadian Seafood & to Watch Some footage Click HERE. As we race into the New Year, it is crucial that we maintain this momentum and reach out to grocers and urge them to join the rapidly growing list of grocery stores and restaurants joining the ProtectSeals campaign.
What's the connection between your grocery store and the seal hunt? Sealers are actually commercial fishermen who earn only a small fraction of their livelihood from killing baby seals for their fur. The vast majority of the sealers' incomes -- 95% actually -- comes from commercial fishing. About two thirds of Canada's seafood is exported to the United States each year, achieving more than $2.5 billion for the Canadian economy annually. This dwarfs the few million dollars contributed to the Canadian economy by the commercial seal hunt.
By choosing to avoid Canadian seafood, you can give the fishermen who kill seals a clear economic incentive to stop the slaughter. So far, our boycott has resulted in millions of lost revenue for Canadian sealers. But we aren't there yet: As of today Canada still refuses to bow to international pressure, and is readying its sealing vessels for the 2009 slaughter.
That's why we urgently need your help to ask your local grocery store to not buy or sell Canadian seafood until the senseless slaughter of seals comes to an end.
Click here to print out & fill a comment card for your local grocery stores :) More than 5,000 grocery stores and restaurants are participating in the ProtectSeals boycott of Canadian seafood. Each one has shifted some or all of its seafood purchasing away from Canada until the commercial seal hunt is ended for good. Across the country, dozens of grocery chains are in discussions with our ProtectSeals team about the tremendous good they can do by joining the campaign -- and they have indicated that they'd like to hear from their customers.
Some of the grocery chains that are participating in the ProtecSeals boycott of Canadian seafood include Whole Foods Markets, Trader Joe's, Harris Teeter, WinCo Foods, BI-LO Supermarkets, Lowe's Food Stores, and Bon Appétit Management Company.
Thanks to dedicated advocates like you, we are getting closer to the day when baby seals can live in peace without being hunted down and brutally clubbed or shot.
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