Story on the news this morning, a Seal grabbed a 5 year old girl off the dock in Vancouver. She's ok, she was wearing a pfd, seal let go and she popped up.

All sorts of talk about unpredicatble wildlife.. are seals lurking blah blah blah blah.... Talk from fisherman about seals stealing their fish, etc. etc.. evil seals..

Barely any mention of.. The girl and her father were cleaning fish and throwing the guts in the water. People do this all the time and the seals grab the leftovers.. Anyone ever thought of having the fishermen *NOT* throw their garbage guts in the water to condition the critters? AAAARGH. the problem is the human behaviour making the seals equate people activities with food... Stop the behaviour and the problem will stop..

Agreed. Kind of like the parent who says, "Susie, go give the bear a bite of your granola bar, and I'll take a picture. Yeah, go ahead and give him a hug and a kiss, too...don't pat his nose quite so hard, you'll hurt him."

Was taking the boat over to Isle Royale once, and saw a yuppie dad stand his 3-year-old (no life jacket) on top of the railing at the front of the boat so the child could see the water rushing by.

Guess who he would have blamed if the kid had gone into the water and through the propellers?

My wife's cousin is an ER nurse; she feels there should be a valid diagnosis code called "Too stupid to live." I'm starting to agree.

+1 Good rant.

Ha, ha! Although it seems this father was only half-stupid -- at least he had his daughter in a PFD.

TOO STUPID TO LIVE............... how awesome is that, I totally agree

We call it Darwinism at work.

The individual bonehead bothers me less than the media coverage about "unpredictable wildlife"

unpredictable? horsecookies.

clean fish on dock, feed guts to seals, leave guts and fish on dock for seals. seal learns to come up and grab things off dock. - the result is *unpredictable*?

Someone realizing it's hardly unpredictable and putting up signs, and bins for fish cleaning would solve 90% of the problem and the seals would stop being conditioned.

The whistle is blowing...get out of the gene pool.

FB

We'll need bear canisters for kayaking next. Or fishing.

I can just see the early models of seal proof canisters now, complete with the park service saying they aren't that heavy or cumbersome:

Some folks think they should wear a "Stupid" sign, so that the rest of us have fair warning.

Bill Engval - originator of "Here's Your Sign"

Making those signs would probably be an even more recession-proof industry than making orange barrels.

Maybe the tide has turned and the seals are harvesting OUR young! They have their "kid harvest" ceremonies underwater where we can't see.