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Protect right whales from dangerous fishing practices
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Dear friends, There are fewer than 500 North Atlantic right whales left. We lost another ten this summer in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. Some of the whales suffered blunt trauma from collisions of boats. Others got caught up in crab fishing nets. Right whales' habitat is close to the shore, which made them a prime target during the peak of the whaling era. They were hunted nearly to extinction, and even though they've been protected for decades, there's been little recovery. Today, the only whales left live along the Canadian and New England coast. As the stewards of the last whales, Canadian officials have a duty to all of us to do everything they can to save the right whales we have left. This summer, they were alarmed enough to close a crab fishery off New Brunswick early, and after news broke of the 10th whale death, the federal Fisheries and Ocean Minister promised he'd implement new rules around commercial fishing gear before next year. These are important and encouraging steps. But this summer's death toll — three times higher than normal — illustrates just how quickly we could lose the entire species. We need to keep up the pressure on the Fisheries and Ocean Minister to ensure he enacts the strongest and most comprehensive rules with a goal of no preventable deaths in 2018. Thank you,
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