January 22, 2015 — With many fishermen complaining about the scourge of seals for decades and the recent phenomenon of great white sharks arriving to nosh on the blubbery – and protected – pinnipeds, Chatham officials had plenty to say when asked to comment on ways to deter “nuisance” animals.
“They really aren’t endangered. I can’t see how 200,000 or more of them sitting on our shores can be (endangered),” said Selectman Chairman Florence Seldin last week, adding that they were so many in one of the Martha’s Vineyard harbors last year that boat traffic stopped.
Selectmen sent out a letter to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Office of Protected Resources that was highly supportive of ways to control seals.
The office is the process of soliciting comments for upcoming guidelines under the Marine Mammal Protection Act. The comments focus on non-lethal and non-injurious deterrents.
“Right now there are no guidelines. So right now you can’t do anything basically and that is a concern for us obviously for
gray seals,” said Robert Duncanson, the town’s director of natural resources.
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