Don’t think they were shot for fun/sport. Most likely fisherman/men.

If people actually bothered to read te comment, I said “I was appalled by the lack of comments”, in reference to the thread after the story. I agree animal cruelty is horrific, I was only summing up the horrific slaughter in Syria and lack of comment from people using this app on that subject. Looking at the thumbs down tells me people don’t care about children being murdered everyday and are more concerned about seals

@Adam Agree.

@Thomas Commenting on the Journal can be very down-heartening when you see peoples reaction to your opinion. So comment carefully, ignore the thumbs voting and grow a thick skin :)

I’ll give a Seal of approval to that

Thanks Sheila for your thoughts. And, don’t worry i have a tick skin. I’m well able for the banter on this, anyway you have a nice day.

and let me be the first to say it – bankers!

…Really!!?!!…. Were you not happy enough with the 5 souls lost last month…..ingnorant replies, from ingnorant people…who said fishermen did it?…..no-one….more than likely this Muppet and his mates……come down to Kilmore Quay……..

@Kevin Calm yourself down there. If fishermen really are killing seals because they’re competing with them then I have little sympathy. Surely they should be more concerned about the tons of fish that are taken from Irish waters thanks to our friends in EU.

I’d love to see the feckers caught as much as anyone, but I think you’ve been watching too much CSI – for the guards to stand any chance of triangulating a phone signal they’d need to know a time, and even then its dubious how accurate the fix would be :-(

too true, i live nearby and its pissed me off no end. more were found dead today, including a dolphin…

Oh let me guess I’m ignorant as I said you had inadequate education because you can’t understand survival of the fittest, or would I be just rude, or ignorant of manners, for the mean remark I made? I hope I didn’t remove your doubt of my foolishness by using a valid point about your understanding of survival of the fittest. Also I did “dumb down” natural selection, it’s not that hard to understand when you put your mind to it, but don’t try just yet, you probably want to try and recover from those atrocious remarks I made about you, so don’t worry I’m sure you’ll understand it over time.
Good night sweet prince.

Yeah I know Mark, and we have all those newspapers wasting space with such trivialitys as crosswords and suduku – disgrace!

So you’re saying that events other than the death of humans aren’t to be considered news? Riiiiiiight…..

I think you have misunderstood -I was talking about the fact that there was no news report on sixty human deaths. The Journal (and its readers) are more concerned about two dead seals. Which would be regarded as more news worthy?

Back to the Irish Times I go…

Every days there are reports on deaths in Iraq, Afghanistan etc. It’s been like that for years now, and to be honest has little bearing on our daily lives. I’m not trying to belittle the deaths of those people, but what are we expected to do? Keep a tally stick and add notches to it daily? This article about seals being shot is news worthy because of the issues which underlie it, as well as the novelty of it.

No Mark I did not misunderstand. I read the IT too, I get my news from many outlets and provide my own balance on things. Animal welfare and wildlife conservation is news and it does concern me.

Better than been eaten by a killer whale , wouldn’t fancy that !

Mark, fair enough point, but what’s wrong with reading more than one news source?

It’s not as if The Journal is a service you’re paying for. Read the articles that catch your eye, ignore the ones that don’t.

What? Have they been caught or identified? I must have missed that

And whether it was done to make a statement or not is wholly irrelevant.

Looks like fishermen in the west and south are taking things into their own hands! Next they’ll be out with their clubs beating the living shite out of these creatures!

http://www.examiner.ie/ireland/fishermen-call-for-cull-of-seals-after-repeated-damage-to-catch-145076.html

Well thank goodness that was cleared up. I’m sure the animals had pleanty of time to appricate the statement while they were dying, in pain. “ A single death is a tragedy but a million is just a statistic” Joseph Stalin. P.S I managed to read the article as well.

Yes these people are at large in our society, not specifically seal shooting but you get 10 minutes outside of the greater Dublin/cork/limerick areas and see how many people (excluding those who actually intentionally buy and love animals) and see how many are willing to shoot a dog who has a broken leg or drown unwanted puppies. Then you might reconsider your idea that these kings of things are rare.

seal hunters at large in our society must keep a look out, have they any distinguishing marks so we can spot them…

Fred the main reason for dwindling fish stocks is man not seals. The EU had to cut quotas last year because of the amount of fish thrown overboard. I also doubt very much that if every seal in Ireland gorged themselves silly everyday they still could eat as much as Irelands commercial catch.

Fred, you get a bloody grip!!!! The seals have more of a right to the fish than the fishermen, it’s bloody nature! Feck sake sick of feckers like you not feeling like a man unless they make some kind of a kill! Neanderthals!!!

I think the way fish are caught on boats is really inhumane! There is no excuse for it, considering the amount of food thrown out by man on a daily basis. If there was a cure for greed, the World would be at Peace in an instant! And so would every living being! Just my opinion…

Who is Mab? Mabus maybe:-) the only cull that is needed is of the psychopath who shot these seals.

What makes you think there are too many seals interfering with the fishermen catch? Why not the other way about? Why has a human more right to that fish than an animal that spends most of its time in those waters? Low fish stock are a symptom of humans over fishing, it’s us that disrupt the balance, not the seals.

Survival of the fittest seems to me to mean over exploitation of every resource to the detriment of other species. We are part of the balance of nature and yet seem to act more like the cancer of it. And how does your survival of the fittest theory work on a more social level, should the rich put a bullet in the head of the poor, the strong in the weak, the able in the disabled?

Chris,

The seals are protected under EU Habitats Directive http://www.npws.ie/marine/marinemammals/ and are listed on Annex II of the Directive. Seals are legally protected.

All that aside I don’t believe shooting two seals in the head without humanely finishing them off is excusable in any sense, the fact that they are protected species just makes the crime more serious in legal terms. I don’t believe that seals are the single reason that fishermen are struggling with making ends meet. Unsustainable fishing, pollution, climate change, too many fisherman competing for the catch alongside the unsustainable fishing methods and maybe then a small impact due to a healthy seal population.

The seals and their prey are part of a balanced ecosystem.
It is the addition of humans armed with technology to this system that had caused the drop in fish numbers.

Eoin, I’d disagree about balance in the ecosystems. nature is naturally in a state of flux and it is natural to have periods where the seals will overpopulate & result in a dip in their food supply. The reduced food supply will eventually result in a reduction in the seal population as less pups will be born or less will survive. There will always be fluctuations occurring naturally but when you add in other factors such as unsustainable fishing etc. then you will certainly alter/impact the ecosystems interactions. Blaming the seals for reduced catch is too simplistic for sure.

Survival of the fittest was an early and loosely used phrase to describe natural selection, thus scientists don’t use it today, just google natural selection, it’s not man vs seal, man vs other animals excluding man itself, it’s not man with shotgun vs whatever he likes! It’s the natural selection of biological traits. Maybe you don’t believe in evolution and you think we are all the spaghetti monsters playtoy in wonderland.

Yeah, I must be hallucinating with the 3 articles every day about Syria.

There is a difference between farming our food and shooting two animals for no other purpose to make a statement.

Man has a long history of exploiting man too, doesn’t make it right or acceptable.

Yeah but you’re still wrong

Again, how does that apply on a social level? Why not weed out the weakest, poorest and most vulnerable in society and stick a bullet in their heads? Surely the same principle applies no?

As I said in response to your earlier post, it might be human nature, but it doesn’t make it right. Fish stocks are low due to overfishing by man so where does your short sighted logic get you and when there is nothing left for us to exploit? Nature is as much about balance as it is about survival of the fittest.

Well said Sean……

Fred, thats an idiotic statement.
With your misinterpretation of the phrase “survival of the fittest” all other animals should be exterminated. after that we would die out within a decade or 2

You should look into human nature a bit more deeply before making statements like that. And general animal nature too.
Humans have always lived in groups, as such we have evolved a range of altruistic characteristics. Despite what modern marketing and pop culture tells you, we are not inherently greedy selfish creatures.

you should read “the selfish gene” by richard dawkins.

Dangerous interpretation of evolutionary science is dangerous

Immediately it’s obvious that you are inadequately educated, survival of the fittest refers to evolutionary differential reproduction i.e. natural selection (which biological traits continue throughout the evolutionary course, as some adapt to their surroundings). It is not about how humans can alter various species surroundings and then claim “survival of the fittest”. Even on a literal sense we are not the fittest, we are the most intelligent species (even then we are not the most suitable for evolution it’s who can adapt), but with our intelligence we have also been ignorant and that’s a trait which seems to remain with you. I’m sure you can make up a good point on this topic but “survival of the fittest”, does a 14 year old have to point out how moronic this sounds?

Ecosystems which go out of balance usually go into drastic decline, for all creatures within them especially the dominant ones