Elephant Seals

Elephant seals exist in two species, Northern and Southern and as the names may suggest, they are located in different parts of the world. The northern elephant seal is located in the Northeast Pacific Ocean of the US, Canada and Mexico and the southern elephant seal in the oceans around the southern hemisphere on islands such as South Georgia, Macquarie Island and the coasts of New Zealand, South Africa and Argentina.

There is not much between the females of both species in terms of size, with both being around 3m, however the male southern elephant seal tends to be a metre or so longer then the male northern elephant seal, at around 4m. The elephant seal is noted as being the largest species of seal. It is no surprise to learn that the elephant seal gets its name due to the rather distinctive nose found on the males, capable of producing a loud roaring noise, and due to their enormous size.

The elephant seal is unusual in that they spend up to 80% of their time in the oceans and have the ability to dive to depths of 1500m, they tend to only really come onto land when they mate and moult. Elephant seals are protected from the cold by a thick layer of blubber. The skin and hair that lies on top of this blubber periodically moults and must re-grow by blood vessels reaching through the blubber.

During this time the seal will be susceptible to the cold and must therefore come onto dry land. The diet of an elephant seal tends to consist of mainly skate, rays, squid, eels and sometimes even small sharks, although they are capable of fasting for up to three months.

In the 1800’s elephant seals were brought to near extinction due to the commercial hunting of them for oil that could be sort from their blubber. It is only because of legislation that gave them protected status that the population has been allowed to grow and they have begun to recover.