Seal cull needed (From York Press)

Seal cull needed

12:08pm Saturday 2nd September 2006 in Letters By Reader's letter

HAS Mandy Carter (Stop the Slaughter, Readers' Letters, August 31) ever been to the mouth of the St Lawrence River on the east coast of Canada and seen the amount of seals there are in the area or is she going by hearsay?

The seals need to be controlled.

There are too many of them already in the area.

This is why the fish stocks around the east coast of Canada have been depleted. The annual seal hunt is controlled by the Ministry of Fisheries. A quota is set every year for the cull and officers are present on the ice floes when the seals are killed. The seals are killed as humanely as possible.

This year, I think the quota for the year was not met.

How about seagulls? Is there not a cull on these birds? What about foxes that go after lambs, or mice and rats that invade people's homes - or is that another story?

Trev Audin, Avonhurst Road, Islington, Ontario, Canada.