Copyright © 1999 NLThomas
All Rights Reserved

Washington state Indians are preparing to resume hunting whales, seals, and other marine mammals as soon as they find markets for the meat and other products, tribal leaders say.

The Makah and Quileute tribes on the North Olympic Peninsula do so now, and others could join them within a year or so, said Terry Wright, a Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission manager.

"The reason they're not out there killing animals now is that they believe they have to be able to utilize them," Wright said Wednesday. "Their philosophy would not allow them to kill animals and then throw them on a garbage pile."

He spoke at a meeting of a marine mammal task force that was formed last year to seek ways to protect Lake Washington steelhead and salmon from sea lions at the Ballard Locks.

Muckleshoot tribal leaders announced plans to kill sea lions at the locks and other areas around Puget Sound last year but never went any farther, probably for fear of a publicity nightmare, Wright said.

Bob Everitt, northwest regional director for the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, said the agency would seek federal permission this year to kill sea lions that have been caught repeatedly preying on steelhead at the locks between Lake Union and Puget Sound.

Animal rights groups are ready to go to court to try to prevent the killing of sea lions, "and I think the tribes are on a public relations disaster course" if they begin hunting marine mammals, said Will Anderson, a Progressive Animal Welfare Society representative.

Nonetheless, Makah leaders have begun meeting with whalers from Japan and Norway in preparation for a resumption of the tribe's historic gray whale hunt.

Potential marine mammal products include seal meat as crab bait, drums made of sealskin and jackets made from sea otter pelts, Wright said.

Tribal leaders believe they are entitled to a commercial harvest of the animals, but Brian Gorman, a National Marine Fisheries Service spokesman, said the issue was far from settled.

"This is the first time, I believe, that this subject has been broached publicly," Gorman said. "There is a difference between subsistence harvest and commercial harvests."