First day as a Winter Wildlife Docent
All the rumors are true. The Winter Wildlife Docent program is an outstanding volunteer opportunity! With three days of training completed in the fall, I was feeling mostly ready to start volunteering on my first shift on January 25th. Fortunately, I was paired with long-time docent, Sterling, who showed me the ropes. I learned so much from him in six hours. We joined two other docents to cover two locations in pairs — the Elephant Seal Overlook and the Lifeboat Station. We swapped locations midway to keep things fresh. Each location offered a different experience with the elephant seals.
Elephant Seal Overlook is a short hike from the Chimney Rock parking lot. The overlook area is large with expansive views of Drakes Bay, and most importantly, of the many elephant seals hauled out on the western side of Drakes Beach. Dozens of seals were laying along the beach and several males were bobbing in the water off shore. We saw males, females, and pups. The pups are easy to pick out in their first weeks since their coat is black. The dark color attracts the sun’s heat to keep them warm. The large adult males are also easy to spot, but the females can be mistaken for younger males. Sterling and I set up two viewing scopes for visitors to get a close view of the seals at the overlook.
Visitors watching Northern Elephant Seals at Elephant Seal Overlook near Chimney Rock on Drakes Bay
In the early afternoon, we switched to the Lifeboat Station located a short walk down a paved road from the Chimney Rock parking lot. What a difference! The seals here are up close and personal — as few as twenty feet away behind a fence on a small area of beach on either side of the Lifeboat Station. Fewer than a dozen seals were in this area though it’s not quite at the peak of the season which is around mid-February (think Valentine’s Day). The seals huddled on the concrete ramp to the right of the Lifeboat Station. Sterling mentioned the texture of the concrete gives their skin a nice scratching and it’s a heat sink - warmed by the sun.
Alpha male elephant seal at the left, two females with their single pups and a third pup who was stealing milk from the female at the right. The pregnant female is on the beach in the distance.
Two females, one large alpha male, and three pups were lounging on the ramp. The alpha male snoozed at the end of the ramp to block access to the females from any challengers. Something didn’t make sense about these numbers — three pups but only two females — one of the pups seemed to be missing a mom. Elephant seals only give birth to a single pup. We saw a female on the nearby beach but she was not interacting with any of the seals on the ramp including the pups. Sterling believed she was pregnant. At the end of our shift, we thought we might see her give birth. She was displaying some of the signs — agitation and contraction-like movements of her body. Sterling shared with me that a telltale sign of a pregnant female is when the outline of her back shows a raised area after the neck and along her backbone. It’s a result of the pup pushing her organs up into her spine. One of the females was nursing two of the pups. This is risky business for the pups since the mom only produces enough milk to fully nourish and wean one pup. Her resources are finite since she will not eat or drink while she is onshore for the month. She uses her body fat to make rich milk for her pup. Two pups nursing on one mom risks insufficient nutrition for both. I’m rooting for both pups to make it.
By the end of the day, I was beginning to recognize the different sounds of the seals. The males have a resonating boom, the pups had a monkey-like screech, and the females were like higher pitched bellowing cows. Sterling did a great impersonation of all three.
Visitors came from near and far to see the elephant seals — some were very familiar with these fascinating marine mammals and for others it was their first encounter. One woman told me she visits every week to see how breeding season progresses. I encouraged her to become a docent next year.
Stay tuned for more posts as the season progresses.