331 



and indeed, all animals, including the great cats, polar bears, coyotes, 

 and eagles to name just a few. 



Thanks to massive doses of publicity in all phases of the news media 

 such terms as sea-clubbing, bunny-hopping, steel- jaw traps, coyote 

 getters, and Compound 1080 have become familiar to most people. 

 Bunny hopping, as you know, is the practice of herding large numbers 

 of rabbits into fenc«d-in areas and then turning adults and children 

 loose on them with clubs. After one particularly bloody venture, it 

 was reported that over 10,000 rabbits had been killed. 



Coyote getters and compound 1080 are both involved in the effort to 

 thin the number of predatory^ animals in the West and Southwest. 

 The "getter'- is an explosive de\dce that expels a cyanide pellet into 

 the mouth of any animal that tugs on it. Compound 1080, 1 ounce 

 of which is potent enough to kill 200 adult humans or 20,000 coyotes, 

 is among a number of poisons which are used in baited carcas^ to 

 attract pi-edators. Needless to say, these methods do not discriminate 

 among the kinds of animals they attract and destroy. Other methods 

 used to thin predator populations include wiring the mouths of coyotes 

 closed, then, while these animals are still alive, cutting out their 

 bladders to be used to lure other coyotes to the same fate. Through 

 these methods, eagles, domestic animals, pets, and human beings have 

 lost their lives, and now there is even concern over the drastic decrease 

 in the coyote population. 



Steel-jaw traps have long been regarded as cruel. The accounts of 

 trapped animals gnawing off their own legs and paws in order to 

 escape are gruesome. Animals which do not escape in this way must 

 suffer untold anguish until they are released by death, either naturally 

 or at the hands of the trapper. These traps can be purchased in various 

 sizes. 



The subject that has been the target of the most publicity, however, 

 has been the clubbing of the seals in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and the 

 Pribilof Islands. Many documentaries have been done, with varying 

 degrees of accuracy. I am sure that most of us have seen at least one 

 of them. 



The sight of a baby seal being killed is distasteful to all of us, par- 

 ticularly when repeated clubbing is necessary. Any inhumanity dis- 

 played during the har\'est of these animals must be eliminated. At the 

 same time, however, we must be sure that we do not hinder the bene- 

 ficial conservation and economic accomplishments of the seal harv^est- 

 ing in the Pribilofs. To ban the taking of all seals in the Pribilofs 

 would put us in default of the treaty to which we are signatories along 

 with Japan, Canada, and Russia, and put us in danger of returning 

 to the tragic days of pelagic sealing. 



The Pribilof Treaty was signed in 1911, when the fur seal popu- 

 lation was found to have dropped from over 2 million in the early 

 1800's to just over 100,000. As an inducement to end the indiscriminate 

 slaughter that had gone on, Japan and Canada were to receive 15 

 percent of the proceeds from the regiilated harvest. The harvest has 

 been conducted under strict conservation methods which, to date, have 

 made it possible for the fur seal herd to grow from that low point to 

 the present 1.3 million, while producing more than $75 million from 

 pelts. To interfere with this treaty by banning the killing of the seals 

 could undo all that has been accomplished over the past 60 years. 

 Further, to ban the killing of all seals would lead to unrestricted 



