And I'm sure that, like some of our members, you will take seven.
Evidence of meeting #26 for Fisheries and Oceans in the 39th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was cod.
Evidence of meeting #26 for Fisheries and Oceans in the 39th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was cod.
9:40 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Gerald Keddy
And I'm sure that, like some of our members, you will take seven.
9:40 a.m.
President, Fishermen and Scientists Research Society
Thank you.
This past spring, I was fishing for groundfish 100 kilometres west of Yarmouth, in the Bay of Fundy, in 600 feet of water. I set my nets in the night, and when I started to haul them back the next morning, most of the fish in the nets had the stomachs torn out of them and the liver and gonads gone. The seals target the part of the fish that is the highest in protein. The fish were ruined, and the seals had also torn holes into my nets when they tore out other fish. I had to give up fishing and come home. I saw a couple of seals around the boat only for a short time, because they mostly stay underwater. I don't know how many were there, but I had never seen anything this bad before for seals in this area. This is happening all over Nova Scotia.
Several years ago, you hardly ever saw a grey seal in the western part of Nova Scotia, but they have moved in. They are more like an invasive species in these new areas into which they have moved, because they weren't here years ago. They are disrupting the whole ecosystem. What few natural predators they did have years back, like the shark, are mostly gone, so there is nothing to keep their numbers in balance.
These animals grow very large. They are huge animals with big appetites. They aren't the small, little seals that some groups advertise on TV. They are vicious animals.
As lobster fishermen along the south shore, when we are hauling our lobster traps, we find the seals are following our boats. When we put back small lobsters, the seals are diving down and eating them. So much for conservation of the little lobsters. This is going on all over Nova Scotia, but it just isn't restricted to Nova Scotia anymore. I've been talking to fisher friends of mine in the U.S., and they are starting to see the same thing, because the grey seals are now moving into their area.
When do we finally do something to bring these numbers of seals to a more historic level before it is too late for our fisheries? Back in the 1960s—and these are DFO records, not mine—there was an estimate at that time of 10,000 grey seals, mostly in the eastern part of Nova Scotia, and none in the western part. From 1976 to 1983, there was a bounty on grey seals, with x number of seals taken every year for the bounty. From 1967 to 1983, they had a cull. Actually, DFO would go out to different islands with the fishermen and actually do a cull. Starting in 1967, when there were only 10,000 animals in the early sixties, DFO thought these animals were detrimental to the fishery, and they started reducing their numbers with these programs. What do you think is going on now when these numbers are now over 300,000 animals and they are showing up in areas where they never were before? Unfortunately, the program was stopped in 1983, I guess due to pressure by people who don't know the real facts.
In other countries like Scotland, where there are wilderness protected areas such as the ones we have, areas that are set up to protect the flora and fauna of sensitive species, grey seals actually move into these areas and upset the whole ecosystem. The very flora and fauna that were being protected were being destroyed by the grey seals. They actually had to implement a cull in these countries to chase the seals off these islands.
This is just a small explanation of what is actually going on. I didn't mention the seal worm that comes from the grey seals and affects our fish, weakens them, and may eventually kill them. We need to do something now to bring the numbers of grey seals to a more historic level before it is too late for our fishery.
I did it in five minutes. Thank you.
9:45 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Gerald Keddy
Thank you.
We have one more witness here, Robert Courtney. Robert has driven to get here today; he wasn't on the original list. We're going to welcome him to the table.
Go ahead.
9:45 a.m.
Robert Courtney As an Individual
To give you a bit of background, I'm originally from Newfoundland--actually, Bill's area. I'm the guy without a home, as they called me at one time at DFO.
9:45 a.m.
Some hon. members
Oh, oh!
9:45 a.m.
As an Individual
I am the vice-president of the North of Smokey Fishermen's Association. Today I am here representing the sealers of Cape Breton.
I don't have anything written down, but I'm going to shoot off the hip. Anyway, I'm here representing the sealers. We do have licensed sealers in Nova Scotia; there are 117 of us. We can do a harvest, but every time we turn around to try to do something, we have blocks fired in our way. This is where we're coming from today.
Actually, I'm not supposed to be here today. I'm supposed to be in court in Sydney for another issue, where I tried to harvest seals.
9:45 a.m.
Some hon. members
Oh, oh!
9:45 a.m.
As an Individual
Anyway, this is the whole problem. You guys can go back and say, yes, there should be a harvest of grey seals. But if you're not going to take down the areas and allow us where the seals are, you can set whatever quotas you want, open it up, but if you aren't allowed where the product is, what's the good of it? You can't harvest it. It's ridiculous.
We have an allocation of 10,000 now. The reason there's only a small amount of it harvested is because we aren't allowed where the seals are. You can't harvest them any time of the year; the juveniles can only be harvested in a two- to three-week window, and it's in February and March. Otherwise it's impossible.
We've worked at this for 12 to 15 years at the North of Smokey Fisherman's Association and with sealers in Cape Breton. We've harvested seals; we've sent meat overseas. We even made a trip one time over there to look for markets, and so on.
It's a touchy issue when it comes to the areas that we go into, but I don't know what other way we could do it. There's definitely a problem with the seals, and something has to be done. But to go out and, say, fire up another 1,000 licences or whatever into history, it's really over capacity right now. We have 117 licences, we have the manpower to do it, but we're not allowed where the product is. That's the problem.
Everybody's calling for a harvest. There is a harvest, we have allocation, but we can't do it. That is one issue.
I know the issue here today is about the grey seals. But since it's the committee, I have to inform you about the share of the harp seals that was given to Nova Scotia.
Last year Nova Scotia, P.E.I., and New Brunswick had an allocation of 1,800 animals for the three provinces. With 92,000 animals for the gulf harvested right off our doorstep, it was an insult to give us 1,800. We were licensed sealers walking around with thousands of animals at our doorstep, and we couldn't harvest them because the allocation for harp seals was stuck.
Anyway, thanks for your time.
9:45 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Gerald Keddy
Thank you, Mr. Courtney.
As you can see, we have a myriad of routes that we come at this issue from, and there are a number of opinions represented at the table. The job of committee will be to study this issue and make some recommendations.
Let me tell the audience that in the past, and I would hope in the future, we've been very fortunate on this committee. We have an all-party committee; every party is represented here today except the NDP. We have always been able to reach a consensus in the past, so we don't have to send in reports. We would hope to be able to do that on this issue as well.
With those comments, I'm going to go to Monsieur Thibault.
Welcome.
November 9th, 2006 / 9:50 a.m.
Liberal
Robert Thibault Liberal West Nova, NS
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thanks for the invitation to join the committee on your western Nova Scotia leg.
I want to join Gerald in congratulating all the panellists for having briefs. I know I have had the opportunity to sit on a number of committees and had presentations from a number of sectors and a lot of lobbyists and experts, and none of them seemed to be able to fart in less than 12 minutes. Such a good, concise presentation in five minutes is excellent.
Mr. Hammill, on the point about the balance in the ecosystem, when I'm looking at the level of predation by seals, it seems to be rather low on the stocks that we, on the coast, see affected directly by seals. I have seen reports before on the effect of the catches on the quality of cod, and it seems to be directly linked. If you look at the health of the cod in eastern Nova Scotia, it seems to be directly linked to the number of seals being caught going up.
Is there a direct competition in feed between the cod and the seals? Would the cod be feeding on the sand lance, or might other species be feeding on the sand lance, so that while the predation might not be direct, the effect of the seal would have an indirect effect on the health of the cod stock?
9:50 a.m.
Research Scientist, Maurice Lamontagne Institute, Department of Fisheries and Oceans
There is overlap. The problem is that cod are probably eating smaller sand lance, whereas the seals are eating big sand lance. When you start to try to quantify this impact, it gets more complicated than just the nice link that you're stating. Yes, there is overlap in diet, but the size composition of the diets for the two groups would be different.
9:50 a.m.
Liberal
Robert Thibault Liberal West Nova, NS
Where would the worm come from? Would that be from the feces that generally puts the worm in the ecosystem?
9:50 a.m.
Research Scientist, Maurice Lamontagne Institute, Department of Fisheries and Oceans
Yes. The cod seems to be the best adapted species for the worm. The grey seal is the best of all the seal species as a host for the worm. The adults live in the seal, then the eggs are shed and they go through a couple of invertebrate hosts, they are eaten by fish, and at that stage they stay in a certain larval stage, and it's when they're eaten again that they mature into adults in the seal. That's a cycle. Yes, they can stay for several years in the fish.
9:50 a.m.
Liberal
Robert Thibault Liberal West Nova, NS
My last question for you is on that 70%, or that ideal population of grey seals that would be stable, not at risk, but at the lowest possible level to have the least negative effect on the fisheries. Do you have an estimate of where that would be? Would that be 10,000 animals, 20,000 animals?
9:50 a.m.
Research Scientist, Maurice Lamontagne Institute, Department of Fisheries and Oceans
The N70 is calculated more with the idea of protecting the resource, which in this case is the seals. That's where you're minimizing any sort of conservation risk. We do not apply this to grey seals right now. If we did, we would prevent the number of seals dropping below 70% times 250,000. I can't do the math in my head.
9:50 a.m.
Liberal
Robert Thibault Liberal West Nova, NS
That would be the assumption that the level now is the stable level, but we have heard evidence that the population was stable at 10,000. I would presume that you could have a population level of much less than 70% of 230,000 and have a stable population.
9:50 a.m.
Research Scientist, Maurice Lamontagne Institute, Department of Fisheries and Oceans
The way the framework works, it's 70% of the largest estimate ever seen, so the largest estimate that we've seen in the last 50 years is current, for sure.
9:50 a.m.
Liberal
Robert Thibault Liberal West Nova, NS
Thank you.
I think I would agree with these gentlemen that we need a new framework at that level.
Glenn, Peter, or whoever can answer, I have a double question. Would we have more effort in harvesting if we had a larger quota? Would it encourage the market investment and all the work that's needed to get the harvesting and the marketing, and is there a market? Can we use it for mink feed, can we use it for human feed, is there a market out there, or are we going to have to have a cull? Is a true cull the only...?
9:50 a.m.
Procurement and Resource Manager, Sea Star Seafoods Ltd.
There's definitely a market. There's an existing market. Right now we're on the doorsteps for 450 metric tons of frozen seal meat at present, and that's potential. It's all but a closed deal.
9:55 a.m.
Operations Manager, D.B. Kenney Fisheries Ltd.
As Mr. Courtney said, the main problem we have right now is that where seals are fishermen can't go. That is the one overbearing problem.
9:55 a.m.
Liberal
Robert Thibault Liberal West Nova, NS
I think we all have to recognize that harvesting on Sable would have huge difficulties, huge problems. Are there other ways to get it, other than Sable, to harvest commercially sustainable levels?
9:55 a.m.
Operations Manager, D.B. Kenney Fisheries Ltd.
I question the logic of harvesting on Sable being difficult.