Northern Elephant Seals or Angry Muppet Seals

​Mirounga angustirostris

The first time I saw a Northern Elephant Seal had to be at San Simeon. If you haven’t been, I highly recommend it! This massive colony of Ellies, as they are affectionately called, always has something going on. You might see the massive Beachmaster males fighting for territory, the females trying to get away from them, the teen males pretending to be tough stuff, or, if you are very lucky, a little baby being born. They all have different sounds, depending on age and sex. The large males sound like a sewer pipe draining, the babies sound like angry Muppets, and the females are somewhere in between. I could watch them for hours. My mother was even a docent there when she lived in Cambria.

When I moved back to California, during my interview at California Wildlife Center (CWC), they had an Ellie weaner (recently weaned baby) in care. I had never seen one up close before! He had very deep, dark eyes and a bowling ball head. I would soon become deeply acquainted with these babies.

We probably treated more than 100 babies while I was at CWC. They were lazy and feisty at the same time. During nap time, it would sound like they were snoring because their nostrils are naturally closed and they have to force them open to breathe, making a pishhh sound. This is an adaptation to help them during their deep dives for food. They were curious and would mash their squishy noses against the fence when you would walk by. I can’t tell you how tempting it was to boop the snoot. They also have large teeth, so that was an incentive not to. You also didn’t want to hang out too long by their snoots because when they would blow open their nostrils, snot often shot out.

These babies had to be taught how to eat fish. Once they were up to a healthy weight with the help of fish/piscivore smoothies, they were put in fish school. This involved sitting on them, holding up their massive heads, and shoving a fish head-first into their mouths. I got to do this once. They have a habit, when they are frustrated, of arching their backs and turning into a donut shape. I was literally sitting on this baby, and I am not small, and he still lifted me up with his donut move!

Once they know what fish are, we would feed them in shallow pools and then graduate them to the bigger pool. When we thought they had the hang of it, they would be returned to the ocean. This almost never went smoothly, as I mentioned, they can be lazy. We would open the crate, and they would not come out. They would yell and fight, and we would eventually have to dump them out. That led to donuts, more yelling, and tossing sand on their backs, which is something they would do to stay cool. The Ellies would not go in the water with us there, so we would have to hike back up to the parking lot and watch them from there. Some took HOURS to get the hint. Eventually, they would all venture out again.

Unless they were spotted at a rookery, we would never know how they fared. Anytime not on a beach was spent well out at sea, diving for more than 30 minutes at a time for deep-sea squid and fish. I recently learned you can track your own Elephant Seal with a Fahlo bracelet. Mine is named Kay, and she is out at sea west of Seattle.
​
I miss working with these noisy, smelly Muppet seals. Any future visits to California have to include a trip to see Elephant Seals.

---

Objection to returning to the water

A half donut

Nap time

A snoot not for booping