Northern Peninsula seal hunt hampered by weather

Newfoundland seal hunters may have to wait another day before starting their hunt, as a storm Monday on the Northern Peninsula hampered efforts for sealers on the island's west coast.

Sealer Monty Gould in Port Au Choix said high winds and blowing snow have translated into no hunting for the day.

"There's nobody moving here today," Gould said. "I mean, the boats all came in, they went into the harbour last night, all the bigger boats. I'm in the smaller fleet and we got to wait until this weather clears up.

"It's up to 60 knots of wind here today," he added. "Some of the bigger boats went out, but I was just down to the harbour and seen some of them working their way back in. They had a real bad time of it out there last night with the weather. Bad, bad storm around there right now."

Gould said he hopes Tuesday's forecast will make for better hunting conditions.

The opening of the hunt had already been delayed by several days because of heavy ice conditions. Ice had been blocking ports along the peninsula, although it was believed much of it was pushed out to sea by strong winds on Sunday.

"It's terrible; the ice was pinning on the land, on the Northern Peninsula around the land," sealer Dwight Spence said Sunday. "The way the wind and the ice was pinning on the land there was no way the boats could get out."

The total harp seal quota for this year is 270,000 seals, a decrease from the 2006 quota of 325,000.