in ten days, thousands of helpless baby seals will be slaughtered

Some of you have see me wearing a hoodie with the message "Club Sandwiches Not Seals".

Many people believe that the clubbing of seals is a thing of the past, but the harsh reality is that the commercial seal hunt goes on.  Last year alone, more than 350,000 pups were shot or clubbed to death on the ice.  Starting March 29, the Canadian government will allow hundreds of thousands more to die.

The baby seals are hunted at an age when they have little ability to move around much, when their mothers have just begun to return to the sea to find food and the babies are left on the ice alone. They have no method of escape or protection. These animals are far from killed humanely; they're bludgeoned with hooked clubs and then skinned. The Canadian board of veterinarians that oversaw the hunt recently acknowledged that many were skinned while still alive.

Here's a video of last year's slaughter, from the Humane Society. Warning: these images are fairly graphic.

Decades of public outcry led to the 1987 ban of hunting whitecoats, which are newborn harp seals.  But it only takes about 12 days for the seals' fur to develop grey patches, at which point they become fair game to hunters.  Ninety-five percent of the harp seals killed are less than three months old.

The Canadian government claims that the seals are hunted because they are eating all the fish, when the truth is the seals are hunted for a frivolous demand of their pelts.  Seal populations have dropped by almost half a million over the last several years and top scientists warn that if a commercial hunt of this scale continues the species could be in jeopardy in the very near future.

The profits from the seal hunt feed the fashion industry, but contribute to very little of the hunters' overall income. The "hunt" lasts for several weeks, and the hunters' main source of income is fishing. You can further help end the hunt by boycotting Canadian seafood, as I've done. Ask your server where their seafood selection come from. Most supermarket seafood is labeled with the country of origin.

Canada's annual commercial seal hunt is the largest slaughter of marine mammals on the planet.  If these seals only lived a short distance to the south, they would be protected by U.S. law.  Our Marine Mammal Protection Act prohibits the killing of all marine mammals - including seals.  It's time Canada recognized the spirit of this act and adopted its own similar policy.

As an active member of the Humane Society and Oceana, I've taken action to stop the Canadian seal hunt.  Will you do the same?

Don't let these seal cubs be killed in the name of fashion, please contact Canadian Prime Minister Harper and your local Representatives and demand an end to this cruel hunt.