The Davis Strait - DCE - Nationalt Center for Miljø og Energi

Figure 5.2.2. Annual number of
king eider, black guillemot and
little auk hunted in West Greenland
from Paamiut to Sisimiut (the
assessment area) in the period
1996-2008. Unpublished data
from Piniarneq, Greenland hunting
statistics, Department of
Fisheries, Hunting and Agriculture,
2011.
Birds shot/year
12000
10000
8000
6000
4000
2000
0
5.2.2 Seal hunting
Seals are important for both part-time and ful-time hunters in the assessment
area. The skins are purchased and prepared for the international market
by the tannery in Southwest Greenland, and the meat is eaten locally. In
the period 2000-2008 more than half a million seal skins were traded in
Greenland. However, in 2008-2009 the market for sealskins collapsed and it
is now difficult to sell the skins (Rosing-Asvid 2010).
Harp seals are caught in large numbers (Fig. 5.2.3), especially during summer
(Fig. 5.2.4). In winter and early spring most of the West Atlantic harp
and hooded seals congregate near the whelping areas off Newfoundland.
However, a small fraction of these seals will stay in West Greenland
throughout the year.
Hooded seal can also be caught throughout the year, but most catches are
made during spring, just prior to and after whelping, when many hooded
seals are close to the assessment area, or in the fall when post-moult seals
migrate through the assessment area towards their foraging grounds in Davis
Strait and Baffin Bay.
The ringed seal are normally associated with sea ice and some live in or near
glacier fjords in the assessment area all year. Catches increase during winter
and spring. Most catches are juvenile seals, of which some are likely to be
seals that have been ‘pushed’ out of the fjords where adult seals make territories
when fast ice starts to form. The assessment area is, however, also likely
to have an influx of seals coming from the Davis Strait pack ice when it
approaches the coast during winter.
Catches of bearded seals also increase in late winter–spring (March-April) in
the northern part of the assessment area when the pack ice comes close to
the coast.
Annual catch
Harp seal: 27-37,000 animals/yr. in recent decades
Ringed seal: