We’re strolling California beaches this week, to appreciate the northern elephant seal, another seasonal migrant.
Once you’ve seen a two- to three-ton male swinging his fire-hose of a nose and bellowing as he chest-bumps the next guy, just to impress the ladies—well, you won’t ask how they got the name. And you won’t even think about getting between two males, or a male and his females, during mating season. Or between moms and babies after birthing. Forget taking a selfie, or any up-close-and-personal shot. Keeping a distance of at least 100 feet offers generous respect. Elephant seals are much faster than they look, and can be fierce.
If at all possible plan to commune with these wild things during winter mating and pupping season, though here and elsewhere along the coast you’ll see at least some of these huge seals year-round. Año Nuevo State Park just north of Santa Cruz is the largest northern elephant seal rookery, but there’s a healthy population to observe at Point Reyes in Marin County and also, south of Big Sur, along six miles of beach at Piedras Blancas near Hearst Castle and San Simeon. Advantages of the San Simeon site: You won’t need to make reservations or take a shuttle, and there are at least some seals to celebrate year-round. Those in the know say that you can even avoid the state-parks day use and parking fee by continuing past the parking lot to the next highway pullout.
The northern elephant seal is the largest pinniped (fin-footed mammal) in the Western Hemisphere. And talk about good migrations: It spends most of its life, eight to 10 months a year, alone. Male elephant seals regularly dive to depths of 5,800 feet and stay underwater for up to two hours; females fish the open ocean. Twice each year they migrate thousands of miles to rookeries on land to breed, give birth, molt, and rest — a life cycle that means some seals are doing something on shore all year round, though mating, birthing and juvenile haul-out periods offer the most impressive numbers. There’s nothing quite like that first glimpse of hundreds and hundreds of these huge seals tossed together like so many World War II torpedoes abandoned among the sand dunes.
Like many whales, hunted to the edge of extinction for their oil-rich blubber, northern elephant seals numbered as few as 20 individuals by the early 1900s. These few survivors lived on an island off the west coast of Baja California. Their descendants eventually began migrating north to California. In the 1950s, a few arrived at Ano Nuevo Island, attracted to its rocky safety. The first pup was born on the island in the 1960s. By 1975 the mainland dunes had been colonized by seals crowded off the island rookery, and the first pup was born onshore. By 1988, 800 northern elephant seals were born on the mainland rookery. Now the total known population is 150,000 to 170,000 — about its pre-hunting size. Only time will tell if this apparent recovery represents an ecological success story, given that the elephant seals’ genetic diversity was all but eliminated in the dark days.
Male northern elephant seals start arriving in mid-December. Since these big guys are biologically committed to conserving their energy for sex, they spend much of their time lying about as if dead, in or out of the water, often not even breathing for stretches of up to a half hour. Not too exciting for spectators. But: When two males battle each other for the "alpha" title, the loud, often bloody nose-to-nose battles are something. Arching up with heads back and canine teeth bared, ready to tear flesh, the males bellow and bark and bang their chests together.
In January the mature females start to arrive, ready to bear offspring conceived the previous year. They give birth within a few days of their arrival. For every two pounds in body weight a pup gains, its mother loses a pound. Within 28 days, she loses about half her weight, then, almost shriveled, she leaves. Her pup, about 60 pounds at birth, weighs 300 to 500 pounds a month later. And here’s an amazing biological adaptation: Although inseminated before leaving the rookery, the emaciated female is in no condition for another pregnancy, so conception is delayed for several months, allowing the female to feed and regain her strength. Then, after an eight-month gestation period, the cycle starts all over again.
