What fucking fuck-head thinks that this is okay? The planet needs to be rid of people that would do this.

Thousands of sealers armed with clubs, rifles and spears have begun the world's largest seal hunt in the ice floes off eastern Canada.

The hunt is expected to bring the poor coastal communities about $C19 million ($A20.8 million), but has been condemned by animal rights activists as barbaric.

The contentious harp seal hunt, the target of protests since the 1960s, begins about two weeks after the seal pups are born when their fur changes from white to grey.

Animal rights activists say the pups are clubbed to death and often skinned alive, but sealers and government officials who monitor the hunt insist the pups die instantly, under strict guidelines. Regulations require that hunters ensure their prey is dead before moving on.

"It's just horrific out there. There is blood all across the ice and seal carcasses as far as the eye can see," Rebecca Aldworth of the Humane Society of the United States said from the Gulf of St Lawrence.

"We've seen seals that were moving around and breathing, that have been left in these piles, some left conscious and crawling."

http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2005/03/30/1111862460489.html