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David Gray - Naturalist

David Gray - naturalist and scientist

Science is indebted to him for many facts elucidating the habits and structure of the Right Whale and the Hyperoodon and humanity owes him a deep debt of gratitude for his successful efforts in establishing a close time for seals, by which he was mainly instrumental in abolishing, I trust for ever, the most cruel features of this occupation.
Thomas Southwell writing about David Gray in the Zoologist, March 1883.

Whaling captains were expected not only to kill seals and whales but also to learn a and record as much as they could about their behaviour and status.

David Gray, had an inquisitive mind and took to zoological studies with a particular zeal, and became a leading expert on Arctic matters, gathering data and collecting zoological specimens and Inuit (Eskimo) artifacts. Many of these are still on public display in Aberdeenshire Council's Arbuthnot Museum in Peterhead and in the British Museum, Natural History, in South Kensington, London.

Frank Buckland, the David Bellamy of his day, met David Gray in Peterhead in the summer of 1870. This was the start of a long and fruitful friendship and collaboration.

Of particular note was their campaign to introduce a degree of management and animal welfare into the sealing industry. At the time over 150,000 seals were being killed each year and it was clear to Gray and Buckland that this was unsustainable. In particular they saw the need for a close season so that the young of the year could become independent before the slaughter of the adults began.

Fifteen or twenty years ago, a pack of seals would heave extended in every direction as far as could be seen with a good telescope from the ship's mast head. The case is greatly altered now: a pack very rarely exceeds a twentieth part of the above size, owing to the cruel manner in which they have been destroyed.
David Gray, Habits of Arctic Seals, 1876.

Buckland addressed the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals at their jubilee meeting on July 22, 1874. Gray, meanwhile, presented a case for presentation to Parliament, including the following eyewitness evidence:

Three thousand is not an unusual number of seals to be slaughtered in a day by a single ship. At this work many of the men do not put themselves to the trouble of carrying clubs, but give the seal a tap on the nose with their foot to stun them, and skin them alive. They have often been seen to try to swim after having their skin taken off.

In 1876 an international close season was instigated to prevent the slaughter of seals before the third of April. This was a great achievement by Buckland and Gray but in reality it was next to impossible to implement and to police and the seal stocks continued to decline.

Links:
Frank Buckland & The Buckland Foundation