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are being bashed, skinned while still writhing and whimpering, and left quivering, 

 blood-soaked, on the ice. The killers withdraw with skins and return for more. 

 The rightful owners of the skins 'being reduced to grotesque heaps of gore, are 

 still recognized as their own by the mothers, who, eventually, when the coast is 

 clear of killers, emerge from the blood-red water and turn the corpses over in 

 instinctive hopes that there might be some life left. 



If this audience can be persuaded to remain in their seats for an hour or so 

 longer, they might contemplate the mother seals, with their noses caressing the 

 gory remains of their young in an agony of anguished grief. Here, once again 

 many of the watchers might identify with the stricken seals in a sensation 

 familiar to many — ^bewildered, anguished grief. 



Can it be possible, many might wonder that our human species can thus rape 

 nature without nature's retribution in some form or other? 



And what small percentage of these Canadians would in the opinion of the 

 Committee on Seals & Sealing come down off their grandstand with anything 

 other than a colossal loathing of the entire disgraceful i)erformance, and, possibly 

 a sense of guilt at having been, for so long, blissfully disinterested in the total 

 implication of cnielty on so monstrous a scale vdthin their own country. 



There will always be the small percentage of unaffected . . . the ignorant, 

 the moronic and simple minded — who exist smugly under the delusion that 

 animals other than humans, no matter how high on nature's intelligence scale, 

 have no feelings, and hence are unworthy of protection from outrage or ex- 

 tinction ; any such concern for animals being, by some twisted logic of their own, 

 construed as a denial of the need to assist human beings anywhere afflicted in 

 mind, body or estate. "Not interest in animals as long as there is a single starving 

 human being" — and worse "All the animals in the world are not worth a single 

 human life." These frantically foolish cliches show an obvious ignorance of 

 the disastrous ultimate doom which would soon be inflicted on their precious 

 "human only" world if nature were to get so far out of balance. 



Considering the second question of what "benefits" arise from tlie scenes 

 described above, the primary beneficiaries must presumably be the killers them- 

 selves ; after all they must undergo considerable risk and discomfort in order to 

 bring about a club to face contact with a newborn seal. The answer seems to be 

 that these people derive enough money from the sale of the skins to the non- 

 essential luxury fashion market to augment the inadequate incomes obtainable 

 from their other pursuits — mostly fishing. Can the problem be that simple? If 

 we can pay farmers not to grow wheat in the interests of price stability, cer- 

 tainly we could pay fishermen not to bash baby seals to pulp in front of their 

 parents, in the interest of "humanity". 



Mr. DiNGELL. Our next witness is Mr. Jiidson Vandevere, Friends 

 of the Sea Otter, Big Sur, Calif. 



STATEMENT OF JUDSON E. VANDEVERE, BIOLOGICAL INVESTI- 

 GATOR, HOPKINS MARINE STATION OF STANFORD UNIVERSITY, 

 PACIFIC GROVE, CALIF., ON BEHALF OF FRIENDS OF THE SEA 

 OTTER, BIG SUR, CALIF. 



Mr. Vandevere. I have submitted my testimony to your reporter, 

 Mr. Chairman. 



Mr. DiNGELL. We will see that your testimony is placed in full into 

 the record, as though you had read it. 



We recognize you for any additional comments you wish to make. 



Mr. Vandevere. I have studied the behavior of the southern sea 

 otters in the course of my naturalist's duties during eight summers at 

 Point Lobos State Reserve (1959-66). Research grants to the Uni- 

 versity of California at Santa Cruz and Hopkins Marine Station of 

 Stanford University have enabled me to continue my studies through- 

 out their range on weekends from October 1968 to July 1969, and from 

 then almost daily to the present time. 



The California Department of Fish and Game has counted only 

 1,040 in the southern sea otters' very limited 160-mile range; the 



