The New Zealand Sealing Industry - Department of Conservation

7. Discussion
Four factors need to be considered in developing a management strategy for
historic places of the European sealing industry:
• Accurate definition of place
• Appropriate representation of variation within the industry
• Potential threats to their heritage values
• Opportunities for their interpretation
These are discussed below, and specific management recommendations are
outlined in Appendix 4.
7.1 DEFINITION OF PLACE
Some of the localities considered above should be discounted as historic places
of the European sealing industry. Although the North Island, Marlborough
Sounds, Canterbury, and Otago Harbour were sometimes visited by sealing
vessels, there is no convincing evidence that the industry was ever pursued
there. At a more specific level, several sites previously attributed to the
activities of sealers in Dusky Sound appear to have alternative, more recent
explanations. The same is probably the case for most of the beaches along the
north coast of Stewart Island (section 6.4.10).
There are 30 localities for which land-based sealing activity can be suggested.
These vary considerably in terms of the precision with which the location of the
activities can be defined (see Table 5 and Fig. 21, next pages). There are 12
places for which the historical evidence provides reasonably precise locational
information. At least half of these (group 1) have already been confirmed by
archaeological observations. In each case one (or more) specific archaeological
sites have already been identified, and others with untested potential located,
indicating that they are best considered as historic areas. These must be
considered the premier historic places of the industry, and managed
accordingly. The localities in group 2 have equally precise historical data on
location, but await proper archaeological assessment at the conjectured sites.
Further investigation by survey and/or test excavation is clearly a priority.
For most of the remaining places the historical data provides only a general
indication of the location of sealing activities. For nine of these (group 3) one
or more archaeological sites have been proposed as a possible specific location.
Further investigation of these may provide confirmation of this possibility. A
similar situation obtains for one archaeological site (group 4) which has
conjectured sealing associations but no direct historical data. Further
investigation of this unusual site should be considered a priority.
There are also six known or probable sealing localities (group 5) which have
not yet been surveyed to determine the presence of specific sealing-related
archaeological sites. Of these, the Kahurangi–Wekakura, Easy Harbour, and
South Cape areas would appear to be particularly promising. Another four
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