_ 3 _ 
     
     O 
     
    
   
   
    
     on the sand. The nest scrape is sometimes lined with bits of broken 
     
     sea shells. Both parents share in the incubation duties, relieving 
     
     each other so each has time for feeding on the lower beach. Both 
     
     adults defend the territory. After four to five weeks the eggs hatch 
     
     and several hours later the young begin to run about, pecking the 
     
     sand in search of food. During the next five weeks the eggs hatch 
     
     and several hours later the young begin to run about, pecking the 
     
     sand in search of food. During the next five weeks the parents may 
     
     be seen escorting their broods dOWn to the feeding territories that 
     
     border the waterfront like cottage lots. While not feeding, the birds 
     
     are usually moving about or resting in the nesting territory. As the 
     
     young learn to fly, they break away from the family group, spending 
     
     increasing amounts of time feeding on their own. By mid August most 
     
     Piping Plovers have left the beaches and are on their way south to 
     
     spend the winter along the Florida and Texas coasts. 
     
    
   
   
    
     — Winifred Cairns 
     
     (Reprinted from the Halifax 
     
     Field Naturalist Newsletter 
     
     No. 3, 1976) 
     
    
   
   
    
       
     
    
   
   
    
     SAVE THE SEAL 
     
    
   
   
    
     Between February 25 and March 15, the annual slaughter of 150,000 
     
     harp seal pups will take place on the Labrador ice floes. Seventy— 
     
     five years ago there was an estimated twelve million adults, today 
     
     less than one million will make the southward journey to breed in 
     
     the ice field nurseries in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and off the 
     
     Labrador coast. Our complacency in light of this obvious slaughter 
     
     which is responsible for the drastically reduced populations is 
     
     alarming. The harp seal is. becoming an endangered species on the 
     
     brink of extinction. 
     
    
   
   
    
     The seals, mostly pups are killed solely for the commercial value 
     
    

    
     of their silken, pure white fur. Furs are made into fashionable 
     
     coats in Europe. Since the pups shed their coats at three weeks of 
     
     age, the commercial seals must kill them when they are still nursing 
     
     on the ice, before they can even swim, let alone defend themselves. 
     
     Every thirty seconds during the hunt, one baby seal is clubbed on its 
     
     head until unconscious or dead, and the pelt is removed. Sometimes 
     
     the week old seals are still aware of the skin being ripped off their 
     
     bodies and they scream in agony until death comes from shock and freezing 
     
     temperatures. Mother seals sometimes remain with the carcasses of 
     
     the babies up to three days, trying to restore them to life, to 
     
     nurse again. 
     
    
   
   
    
     Norwegian sealing ships hire about four hundred Canadians in Halifax 
     
     and transport them to the Labrador harp seal nursery where in a space 
     
     of four days they leave a trail of blood for twenty miles in every 
     
     direction. Canadian Coast Guard ice—breakers clear their way in to 
     
     the heart of the seal territory. Canada also proVides costly rescue 
     
     services to the Norwegian ships. Although we can hardly deny these 
     
     latter services they do encourage and subsidize the hunt, in the sense 
     
     that if they weren't supplied the sealers would not venture into 
     
    

    
     the treacherous ice floes. 
     
    
   
   
    
     Conservationalists mounted such incredible pressure against the seal 
     
     hunt during the early 1970's, that Canada was forced to ban all 
     
     large—scale commercial sealing in the Gulf of St. Lawrence in 1972. 
     
     The Canadian Embassy in West Germany received thousands of letters 
     
     each weeks from Europeans who wanted Canada to end the seal kill. 
     
     Most pressure in North America originated from Brian Davies and 
     
    

    
     the International Fund for Animal Welfare, which sent observers and 
     
     film makers onto the ice every season until Canada finally halted 
     
     the Gulf killing by Norwegian sealers. The hunt then moved to the 
     
    
   
   
    
     Atlantic side of Labrador, unbeknown to many environmentally concerned 
     
     people.