Are harp seals really hindering the recovery of Newfoundlands cod stocks?
While overfishing by humans was undoubtedly a factor in the collapse of Northwest Atlantic cod stocks, a wide range of factors may be responsible for their slow recovery thus far. Whatever the cause or causes, the Canadian government is adamant that commercial sealing quotas are set solely based on how best to conserve seal stocks, and are not influenced by any attempt to help groundfish stocks recover. As for how many fish seals actually consume, there is also a lot of uncertainty, except for one thing: they consume a lot! Consider these statistics. One harp seal eats about 6 lbs of fish per day. According to a 2004 survey, the Northwest Atlantic harp seal population now stands at about 5.8 million, nearly three times what it was in the 1970s. So those seals eat an average of 34,800,000 lbs – or 15,785 tonnes – of fish every day! Or 5,761,589 tonnes per year. This compares with Canadas annual wild fish harvest quota of just 1 million tonnes per year.
