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March 10, 2007

Año Nuevo: Stalked By A Harbor Seal

When the tide is out a bit, I love to walk along Cove Beach in Año Nuevo Reserve. It's a nice long stretch of probably about half a mile and I'm often the only person on it, especially early in the morning. It's become a loser beach for young male elephant seals who don't establish their dominance and set up harems, as well as young seals just learning to swim.

On more than one occasion, I've been wandering down the beach, looking up at the rocky cliffs or examining something in the sand, and not noticed a large male elephant seal hauling out of the water behind me. It's no big deal, I'm just between him and the nice spot he's picked out to lay in. I just get out of the way. Still, I've learned to keep one eye on the water as I'm walking along, just to avoid that little "EEP!" moment.

Elephant Seals aren't the only marine life around by any means. One morning I was walking along Cove Beach and I glanced out into the ocean, and I saw a little seal. I know the picture above is a bit dark, and a wet seal looks like, well, a wet seal, but this particular one had very splotched coloring and it didn't look like an elephant seal weaner.

Año Nuevo Island and the adjacent mainland beaches make up one of the most important pinniped rookery and resting areas in central and northern California... Harbor seals are much smaller and quite wary and elusive.
...
Harbor seals live on the island all year and breed there in April and May. They can often be seen bobbing in the surf just off the reserve's beaches, with only their heads out of the water. They can also be seen occasionally on offshore rocks where the mottled pattern of their coats is apparent.

More At: Año Nuevo SR: Marine Life

It was a harbor seal, a relatively young one and I was to find it was a very curious one. I looked at her (inquisitive seals are always female). Ok, so that's probably not really true, but I could not examine the seal's unmentionables and it sounded good and I hate calling the seal an "it".

So, anyway, back to my story. I looked at her and she looked right back at me. She was probably about 35 feet away. After a few long moments of eye contact, I turned and continued to walk down the beach. About a handful of steps later, I looked out to sea again. She was still there, right even with me. I was surprised. I walked further and she stayed parallel with me the whole way, never coming closer or putting any distance between us. She tracked me all the way down the beach, for at least a quarter of a mile.

The episode has stuck with me. Really, think how many times you have been followed by an animal. Specifically one that has not been domesticated or one that expects food from you. It doesn't happen very often.

Posted by sorsha at March 10, 2007 8:28 PM