I have never been so thrilled to see what’s going on in nature as I was a few days ago...
An old friend brought her new pup — her firstborn — to the local bay where I’ve been seeing her fishing and hanging out off and on over the past several years.
Have you ever known a wild animal and been blessed to share a little bit of its life with you, on its terms? It was a sweet and lovely moment I will never forget. I so hope she brings her pup back to the bay and I can see them again.
We were out on the boat getting it ready to go up to the marina for our haul-out appointment. The sky was gray and heavily overcast — dark monochromatic sky and water. I heard a strange wailing call....some kind of bird? Searching across the water, I located the sound and realized it was a young seal pup! Harbor Seals are silent most of the time; you may hear some barking now and then when many are hauled out on a rock at close quarters. But usually seals are loners, roaming their general home area, and aren’t talking to anyone. Baby seals talk to their moms though and that’s what I was hearing. “Maa-maaa-maaaa”
The pup was swimming toward a dock and behind came its mom (I know that because dad seals never raise the babies). Seals are air-breathing mammals but they are so well-adapted to an aquatic life most of their activity is under water. We humans see just a tiny part of their behavior, and may get the wrong impression about their speed and grace if we only see them hoisting themselves laboriously onto their haulout rocks.
How do I know this is the same seal? One reason is her behavior. Unlike most seals, who dive and are gone on catching sight of a person, Friendly Seal has been comfortable with us and sociable since we met, swimming closely around the kayaks, with lots of eye contact, listening to us speaking to her in wee folk language. Absolute confirmation of her identity is in her markings; Harbor Seals have permanent patterns in their fur coat, like a fingerprint. They molt annually but each new coat has the same markings as before. I’ve been taking pictures of Friendly Seal for years and know those horseshoe shapes behind her ears, and other markings.
The Daily Bucket is a regular feature of the Backyard Science group. It is a place to note any observations you have made of the world around you. Rain, sun, wind...insects, birds, flowers...meteorites, rocks...seasonal changes...all are worthy additions to the bucket. Please let us know what is going on around you in a comment. Include, as close as is comfortable for you, where you are located. Each note is a record that we can refer to in the future as we try to understand the patterns that are quietly unwinding around us.
The pup is more gray than mom and has a blunter face profile. This pup is not a newborn but isn’t more than a few weeks old, judging by its size. In the northern Salish Sea harbor seals give birth in mid-June to early July. Baby seals start swimming within an hour of birth but they aren’t very strong for many months. They like getting a lift from mom, which is what the pup is trying to do here. It’s tired from all the swimming.
Seal pups need to rest on shore for hours at a time. Moms leave them somewhere safe so they can go fishing. While she is nursing a seal requires lots more calories than usual to generate her very rich milk, and since she can’t dedicate as much time to fishing, even leaving her pup on shore, mothers lose about half their weight over the 6 weeks before pups are weaned. I have never seen Friendly Seal haul out onto the beach here, not even on deserted winter days, and in summer there are people and dogs on the beach most days. Very dangerous for a pup.
Where does she haul out, and where does she leave her pup while she’s fishing? I have no idea. Female harbor seals range several miles from their home base and there are a number of offshore islands and rocks in the area. Since she knows this bay really well she also knew what an expedition it would be bringing her new pup here to see it. I feel honored to have been here to meet her new baby.
To give you an idea what a newborn seal is like and the dangers it faces, take a look at this encounter filmed by the WDFW.
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My history with Friendly Seal
goes back to a startling day kayaking in this same local bay. It was autumn 2013. Mr O was working on the sailboat and I was dawdling around in my kayak. I felt a bump behind, twisted around to see and it was a small seal nosing the stern of my purple kayak. For the next hour we played a game: she circled behind to give me a bump or pushed against the side, rocking my kayak. I’d try to turn to keep her in sight since she preferred to sneak up on me. She won the game of course!
Over the next year I saw Friendly Seal often in the bay. She fished and lounged and played. I decided she was more likely female since males are somewhat bigger. Other seals roamed into the bay, but FS spent far more time here than any of them. If she was in the bay on a day I was kayaking she’d invariably come over to say hi, and play for a while — a very friendly seal! One of her favorite games was rubbing along the underside of my kayak. It is a strange sensation, feeling a seal on the other side of a quarter inch of plastic.
I never felt threatened by FS. She was playing. One time she wiggled up onto Mr O’s kayak, nearly tipping it over, but she was clearly not being aggressive. There was a strange seal around that day and she may have been making a statement about “her bay” and “her toys.” Mr O says she was watching the other seal during that incident.
Since FS never comes ashore I have rarely seen her whole person, besides some sketchy UW footage. However during the warm half of 2014 the Tulalip Tribe, which has property along the bay dating back to the salmon-fishing era, removed their old derelict wooden dock and replaced it with a spiffy new metal one. Orange floats were set up to enclose debris from construction. On a few warm afternoons FS rested on the floats.
In the summer of 2014 I watched to see if Friendly Seal showed any sign of pupping…..none. She was in the bay often. By fall however she began coming into the bay more intermittently. It occurred to me maybe she was a youngster: playful early on but now growing up and more standoffish. This fall 2014 picture of her full sharp set of teeth tells us she is a young seal since the teeth of older seals are worn down and sometimes missing.
When she did appear it was always a delight to play the slide-under-the-kayak game. Close up on those occasions I marveled at her smooth beautiful patterned fur and how she danced sleekly around the boat — power and grace, immersed in her element. I've always envied her and wished I could swim with her like that.
The summer of 2015 came and went with occasional visits from Friendly Seal. Again, I didn’t see her with a pup. Female Harbor Seals begin breeding from age 3-5 so if she was a youngster when we met — and a female — I’d expect to see her breeding soon.
Last fall, I was so happy to see her agan after long months absence. This was a very dark overcast day, the silvery water flat calm under a gray sky. Friendly Seal was in a quiet mood, leisurely movements, sometimes dozing. Knowing what I do now, she was newly pregnant. Seals mate underwater sometime in September.
We’ve seen her occasionally since then. Once she watched with great interest, swimming round and round the boat, when Mr O was scuba diving underneath it to clear barnacles off the rudder.
She has a particular fascination with kayaks. And Mr O more so than with me. Here she sneaks up on him from behind.
A month and a half ago, she joined us briefly on a seastar inventory expedition.
You can imagine what a joyous moment it was to see her with her own little one last week! Friendly Seal — a mother! It’s difficult work being a seal mom and I’m grateful she decided to come by the bay.
Harbor Seal pups are weaned at about 4 weeks. That’s not long to build strength and learn skills for adult life. Most sources say harbor seal pups are on their own for food after weaning, joining a social group of other newly weaned pups at the haulout site. Sometimes pups stay with their mothers for a little while after weaning. I hope Friendly Seal returns to what I like to think of as “her home base”, this bay, with her pup. I’ve been checking the bay daily since that wonderful day, morning and afternoon, but haven't seen her yet. Perhaps when the pup has grown a bit more and can manage the long swim from wherever it is they haul out. I’ll keep you all posted.
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Information about Harbor Seals in general, and the Salish Sea seals in particular, can be found in this comprehensive 2014 Washington Dept of Fish and Wildlife document and at www.pinnipeds.org/....
I’ve bucketed about Friendly Seal quite a few times before. For more pictures and stories, see
October 12, 2015
May 22, 2015 (and this Bucket has links to 3 previous episodes)
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All nature observations welcome in the bucket. What are you seeing in your natural neighborhood today? New life?
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