In 1965, the Canadian government asked Brian Davies and a small group of consultants to visit the ice off the coast of Newfoundland, to observe the seal hunt and make recommendations to improve it. What they saw shocked them. Hundreds of thousands of seal pups were killed in a matter of weeks. Brian decided to dedicate his life to save the seals.

In 1969, Brian and the International Fund For Animal Welfare (IFAW) began bringing cameras out to document the hunt and bring it to the attention of the public. Some considered this the birth of the modern animal welfare movement.

Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, IFAW brought the brutality of the seal hunt to television screens worldwide. Public opinion turned and after European parliament passed a resolution banning the seal hunt, the Canadian government relented and banned the hunt in 1987.

It didn't last long. Although new rules are in place to try and make the hunt more humane, it continues to this day. In 2012, the Canadian government set the seal quota at 400,000 - the highest in history.

To help save the seals, join IFAW in telling Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Minister of Fisheries and Oceans Dominic Leblanc to develop a plan to buy out commercial sealing licenses, and end the commercial seal hunt now.

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