The Truth About the Killing of Marine Mammals

This page does not necessarily reflect the official British Divers Marine Life Rescue policy on this subject

Warning, some of the pictures below are of a graphic nature.

Scotland is home to the majority of the UK's seals, the largest colonies being off the West coast. The world population of grey seals is about 350,000.

The last cull of grey seals undertaken in Scotland was in 1977 but was abandoned after public outcry.

Not only does Scotland have internationally important seal populations around its coast, it also has a moral duty to protect them. Seals and other wildlife are tourist trade assets and generate revenue. In 1996, seal watching, on it's own, was estimated to be worth at least £36 million to the UK economy.

In 1998 salmon netting was worth between £6 and £11 million to the national economy. The industry is in decline and supports a handful of people.

Falling fish stocks are continually blamed on the "overpopulation" of seals. As said above the world population of Grey seals is about 350,000, during world history the seas contained millions of seals and there was no lack of fish, it is the wholesale hoovering of fish from the sea by all nations that has led to the dearth of fish. The Canadian Cod fishing industry is finished, not because of seals but by the fishermen themselves and yet they still wish a cull of seals to "encourage the regrowth" of fish stocks, you couldn't make up this drivel. This is also the country, of course, which actively encourages the slaughter of Harp seals yearly even though the world is hammering on it's door to stop it.

Fish is the staple of the grey seals' diet. However, scientists estimate that the total amount of cod consumed by grey seals in the North Sea is less than one-tenth of that caught by commercial fisheries. In addition, not only is cod being over-fished commercially but so also are other species such as whiting, haddock, plaice and sand eels.

Due to EU regulations fishermen, in some circumstances, must return fish caught in their nets if they are, variously, undersized or the wrong species. This can easily amount to half the catch in their nets, sometimes more. "That's a good idea" you may be saying. How about if I tell you that the vast majority of this returned fish is dead? When caught in a net and brought to the surface most of these fish's swim bladders have burst or they have suffocated by inability to swim breathe. This must account for thousands of tons of fish a year. Another case of "you couldn't make this up"! Not only does this mean a waste of marine resources it means that the fishermen must remain at sea for longer, putting their lives in danger for longer than necessary. The fishermen, themselves, are exasperated by this situation. We can agree with the fishermen that EU politicians couldn't run a party in a beer-making facility.

The government has seen some sense and banned sand eel fishing for now, too late for the millions of dead seabirds.

The salmon farming industry requires 3 tonnes of caught fish to produce 1 tonne of farmed salmon. You'll excuse me if I fail to see  any economic worth in this. Many of these, so called eco-friendly farms, poison the sea bed around them by encouraging algal bloom. They also have regular "escapes" of their fish which can endanger wild Salmon stocks.

Salmon farms and Salmon nets regularly entrap diving seabirds and porpoises, drowning them.

Many fishermen believe that seals are their direct competitors for the limited amount of fish available and argue that a seal cull would remove this competition. Fishermen certainly know their craft as far as sailing, tides, whereabouts of fish etc but they seem to have no idea about the complex ecosystem that is the marine environment. The relationship between species cannot be viewed in so simple a way as to suggest, for instance, that fewer seals will mean more fish available for fishermen. There is no scientific evidence to suggest that this would be the case, in fact, some scientific studies suggest that there could even be a reduction in fish populations if no seals are present. It is also well known that many scientists believe that culling seals is not an effective strategy for fisheries management.

It is estimated that approximately 3500 seals are shot "legally" in Scotland by members of the salmon industry every year. This figure could be well out as many of these animals are, once shot, roped and weighted to sink the carcass.

The Conservation of Seals Act 1970 is the legislation enacted to protect seals in UK waters. We believe that this weak legislation does not provide adequate protection for seals and that it requires to be radically amended.

The act allows for any seal to be shot in the "vicinity" of salmon nets, however this "vicinity" is not stipulated and it seems this now translates to "you can shoot any seal as long as it's not in Norwegian waters"

One seal rescuer and rehabilitator, Ross Flett, in Orkney had his life threatened when he spoke out about an illegal killing frenzy there.

We have anecdotal evidence that fishermen have, variously, clubbed seals to death (completely forbidden), shot porpoises and shot seals well outside what could even be elastically said to be the vicinity of nets.

We know that they will shoot the water near a hauled out seal (that is nowhere near any nets) to frighten it into the water and then shoot it in the water allowing an ebb tide to take the body out to sea.

Since this act came in to force there has been ONE successful prosecution in Scotland, does that make you wonder? Remember, this act has been in force since 1970! According to that figure the Salmon industry are angels, conservatively, they have killed 120,000 (could be twice that for all we know) seals down the years and only one has been killed illegally.

Here are a few examples of what can be shot and what we have encountered:-

These two animals, can legally be shot. Salmon netters have, themselves, boasted to us that they have shot animals this age, by the way the animal in the middle was still suckling from it's mother and the dead pup (right) still has it's umbilicus showing.

Animal, caught in monofilament netting, has probably been unable to breathe and hauled out. It has then been clubbed to death, there were no signs of bullet holes in this carcass.

Not conducive to a nice day at the seaside when this washes up as you want to go for a swim.

Grey seal female shot, took 40 minutes to die, and post mortem aborted the next day.