SRRC Lenie ’t Hart has lodged an objection with the Provincial Executive of Friesland this week, because the government authority has granted the Texel Institute Imares (prior known as Alterra) permission to catch and kit out seals with transmitters once again. A lot of commotion arose in 2005 over a grey seal which was repeatedly seen near IJmuiden with a (at that moment defect) transmitter attached to the back of its head. Dozens of alerts came in daily at the SRRC. Even though Imares’ spokespersons assured the public at that time that nothing was wrong with the seal, it was found dead a couple of months later on Vlieland. Autopsy reports showed that the animal had starved to death.
The SRRC is opposed to the use of transmitters on several different grounds.
Animal Welfare
It causes animals a lot of stress to be fitted out with a transmitter. They are caught with the help of large nets and speedboats while they are resting out on the sandbanks. Afterwards, they have to be kept completely still for over 20 minutes, so the transmitter can be stuck on their head with epoxy adhesive. For this, they have to be forcibly restrained; larger animals are tranquilized. After having glued the transmitters to the animal’s neck, the animals are weighed and measured. Often too, blubber is subtracted from the animal’s flank and blood samples are taken.
As long as the transmitter is attached to the animal, it causes problems for the animal: Seals are perfectly streamlined animals, which is why they are able to rocket through the water with relatively little effort. The animals reach speeds of 30 km an hour when they are hunting for fish. Research has shown that the transmitter adversely affects this streamline. This is why the SRRC has been protesting for years, both against research centre Imares for putting transmitters on seals and against the ministry of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality who commission this kind of animal testing.
Research into effect of transmitters
To see what effect transmitters have, the SRRC has asked the Dutch/German company FlowMotion (www.flowmotion.nl) to study the effect of such transmitters on seals. For the last ten years FlowMotion has been the most specialised bureau of engineers in the field of hydrodynamics. FlowMotion has close contacts with the Technical University of Delft, especially with the faculties of Mechanical Engineering and Aerospace Engineering and their laboratory for hydrodynamics. Flowmotion’s expertise, experience and advanced flow-simulations have made it possible to study what effects such transmitters have on a seal in detail. The results of this study show that the transmitters cause changes in the currents surrounding the animal. The disturbance of the natural hydrodynamics of the seal causes the natural behavior patterns of seals that are carrying a transmitter to differ from their normal behavior. Their energy consumption increases, and above all, they are less capable to catch sufficient food. All in all, this causes a decrease in body weight and considerable harm to the health and well being of the animals involved.
Doubtful scientific merit
Transmitters are used to find out more about the seals natural behaviour and to learn about their natural habitat. But to what extent do transmitter seals convey natural behavior? Now we know that transmitters influence seals’ behavior we have to pose the question whether research data gathered with the help of these transmitters actually has enough scientific merit.
08-07-2007 Source: SRRC Lenie 't Hart
