The Cruelty

Each year, independent observers report horrendous abuses at the seal hunt, including the hooking, dragging, and skinning of live seals. Every veterinary report on the seal hunt done in the past 5 years, and seal hunt footage obtained by IFAW and others, documents the ongoing, unacceptable cruelty involved in this hunt. In 2001, a veterinary panel studied this hunt. They discovered that the hunt results in considerable and unacceptable suffering.
42% OF THE SEALS THEY EXAMINED DID NOT HAVE ENOUGH EVIDENCE OF CRANIAL INJURY TO GUARANTEE UNCONSCIOUSNESS AT THE TIME OF THE SKINNING. In defense of the hunt Canadian officials stated that the seals only appear alive because of a 'swimming reflex'. The Marine mammal regulations state that sealers must conduct a “blink reflex test” in order to ensure that a seal is dead before moving on to the next. However, sealers rarely perform this precaution, and as a result, seals are skinned alive. Sealers have been documented leaving seals to choke on their own blood for as long as 90 minutes, cutting open animals as they struggle, stabbing seals through the skulls with illegal weapons, shooting seals and leaving them to suffer, dragging conscious seals across the ice with boat hooks, leaving seals to die in piles of dead and dying animals, and kicking and stomping seals.

* The 2001veterinary survey found that
“…the present seal hunt fails to comply with basic animal welfare regulations.”
“There is undoubtedly an obvious need to reduce the suffering and improve the welfare of these animals by alterations in existing regulations and increasing their enforcement.”
“We conclude that the hunt is resulting in considerable and unacceptable suffering.”

*A 2005 veterinary panel, organized by the World Wildlife Fund, report noted that
“The competitive nature of the hunt…creates an environment in which speed is the rule, and hunters may be encouraged to take shortcuts.”
“DFO [the Department of Fisheries and Oceans] appears to lack sufficient dedicated capacity to monitor and enforce regulation of the hunt, especially at the Front.”

*A 2008 veterinary report by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) found that
*effective killing does not always occur in practice
*during Canada’s commercial seal hunt animals may suffer pain and distress
*sealers do not often comply with the Canadian regulations
*claims made by the Canadian government that 98% of seals are killed humanely are “scientifically incorrect”.