|
The seal in question was a large bull that had been hanging out with five other seals for over a year at the confluence with the American River, and Sacramento river roughly a 100 miles from the ocean.
When asked why the seals were there a biologist said: "The animals likely are here because of an imbalance in their population or their environment that has driven them to travel farther for food."
Then it occurred to me....What population imbalance is that? Overpopulation because a lack of action by man.. Perhaps?
For thousands of years that area was inhabited by Native Americans who harvested the rivers for salmon for food. Any seal that came up the river would of just been killed by the Native Americans and eaten.
So the natural balance was that seals native to the marine environment could not eat Salmon in their river spawning runs, because of...... Man.
Man as part of.... rather then aside of.... the natural balance of nature... what a concept, and certainly a concept that is almost completely overlooked in management..
Now we have protections that do not allow man to kill any seals, and that is precisely the imbalance involved here.
What the environmentalists want to pretend is that nature should exist as if man never existed, but that ignores the fact that man has been a part of nature, part of the natural balance for hundreds of thousands of years.
If we want a more balanced natural picture in the future it would have to be based on historic roles. Certainly we should allow man to kill seals in some conditions, like when they swim into salmon runs.
There is a difference between killing seals when the come into harbours or river systems where they would of traditionally been killed and going out to the rookeries and slaughtering baby seals for their skins.
We have a role to play as a top predator, but it has to be used in moderation to fit the historic balance of nature. That is what the environmentalists and their blanket laws of protection... overlook.
Jim
|