Sea Shepherd

[Paul Ward]

Email received 17th Feb 2006:

Hello Mr. Paul Ward,

I have just read you fact page about Antartic whaling and I am glad that people have this info available. I have just returned from Antartica and have seen Japan and there killing machine at work. We did everything in our power to interupt there whaling but were unsucesful due to the fact that our ship was to slow.

For further facts and info please visit www.seashepherd.org They are a very progressive direct action organization and the only international law inforcment agency in the world. Keep the information flowing. I hope that in the near future the world will learn or be forced to stop this horrible slaughter.

Sincerly
Trevor VanDerGulik
Marine Engineer



Hi Trevor,
Many thanks for your email, great to hear from someone who was on the Sea Shepherd. I was following your progress while you were trying to stop the Japanese whalers as were many other members of the Cool Antarctica Forum. I hope you don't mind my posting your email and this reply there, you might like to take a look:

<this post>

or even reply there..?

"We did everything in our power to interupt there whaling but were unsucesful due to the fact that our ship was to slow."

Don't underestimate the effect the publicity about your voyage had on the world - your effect may not have been immediate, but it hopefully will be long lasting.

Paul Ward

[DeepMarket]

So many have tried and failed to stop this mass murder.
When will government take real action and get navy ships out there?

[Pirates Armada]

Canadian Seafood Boycott is Beginning to Really Hurt the Seal Killers

It has been 15 years since excessive overfishing by Newfoundland destroyed the North Atlantic cod populations. Back then, the Newfoundland fishermen and the Canadian politicians swore they knew what they were doing and insisted the cod numbers were healthy right up until the day the entire fishery collapsed.

They all acted shocked when the cod fishery died although conservationists had been warning them for years that collapse was inevitable.

The cod are not expected to recover.

Currently, the same ?experts? are insisting that the seals populations are healthy even as they slaughter over 325,000 each year in what is the largest mass slaughter of any marine mammal population anywhere in the world.

Now, the latest fiasco is the mismanagement and greed of the crab fishery that has resulted in another crash and this financial blow coupled with the international boycott of all Canadian seafood products has just hit Newfoundland with the force of an economic sledge hammer.

This week about 700 seafood processing workers were laid off after Sea Treat Ltd. shut down plants in three rural Newfoundland communities and one in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia.

This is the latest is a recent string of plant closings.

"We could be heading towards a crisis," Newfoundland Prime Minister Danny Williams said. "A lot of these things that are happening here are things that are completely out of our control."

It appears Danny Williams has just realized what many environmentalists have known for years ? that Newfoundland is heading once again into another crisis.

The union representing nearly 20,000 Newfoundlanders are worried. Plummeting shellfish and crab prices have been the major force behind the sagging state of the fisheries this season, said Earle McCurdy, president of the Fish, Food and Allied Workers Union.

The Sea Treat closings are part of a wider malaise plaguing the fisheries, said George Rose, professor and chairman of fisheries conservation with Memorial University's Marine Institute.

The Newfoundlanders as usual are blaming everyone but themselves. They blame the rising value of the Canadian dollar, competition for crab from the United States and China, higher fuel prices, and of course, they blame the seals, the whales, the seabirds, and the animal rights and conservation organizations.

?The seafood boycott is not helping,? said one Newfoundland fisherman. ?Our products are being given a bad name because of these stinking seal lovers,? he complained.

The boycott is having an effect. Fishery Products International Ltd., considered the vanguard of the fishing business in Newfoundland and Labrador and crucial to the economic livelihood of the province's south coast, lost $10.5-million last year. Created by the federal and provincial governments from the bankrupt shells of previously collapsed firms, FPI has temporarily closed its Marystown operation, putting 650 employees out of work for the first five months of this year. The company also plans to permanently close its Fortune plant, eliminating 345 jobs, in July. Former employees in Harbour Breton haven't worked for more than two years, except for top-up projects to extend their employment insurance claims.

If Newfoundland is to recover they must learn to live in harmony with all the species that humans are independent with. A healthy population of seals is essential for a healthy fish population. That is an ecological fact.

Newfoundland is in economic dire straits because of gross incompetence, mismanagement, and greed in their fishing industries over the last century. Scape-goating the seals instead of curbing their greed has brought them to where they are today.

?Perhaps it is time that Newfoundlanders look at taking a more ecologically-healthy approach to living off the ocean.? Said Captain Paul Watson. ?Wiping out seals and seabirds, whales, and fish is not the smartest thing to do if you wish to survive and live by the sea.?

The Canadian seafood boycott is growing and it will continue to grow until Canada abolishes the mass cruel slaughter of hundreds of thousands of seal pups every spring.

The Canadian government refuses to acknowledge that the international Boycott of Canadian Seafood products is having an effect despite the fact that they are funding public relations campaigns to counter the impact of the boycott.

The Canadian government has for years unfortunately been unable to see the cause and effect of their economic woes until it is too late. Perhaps they will acknowledge the boycott when the final fish processing worker is laid off and sent home.

More likely, however, they will simply blame us stinking seal lovers.

Sea Shepherd News
News Releases

[Pirates Armada]

http://www.seashepherd.org/leviathan/

The U.N will chip in the rest of the money if the goal isn't reached i would speculate?

[Trevor]

Sea Shepherd is returning with more gear and the intent of shutting down this slaughter down keep up to date at www.seashepherd.org !!!!!
Trevor

[Paul Ward]

Hi Trevor,

Good to hear from you again.

Keep me posted, blog-links, pictures, details of operation etc. glad to help with publicity where I can.

Help Sea Shepherd protect the oceans here: http://www.seashepherd.org/donate.html