Seals and Sea Lions Page 1

Southern Elephant seal
Circumpolar, found on most subantarctic islands including South Georgia.
Largest of all seal species.

Male:        Length: 6 meters  weight 3.5 Metric Tons
Female:    Length: 3 meters  weight 900 kg.

nr.503b
Female Elephant Seal, Curverville Island, Antarctic.This means: You are too close!!!
nr.476
Male Elephant Seal, Gold Harbour, South Georgia. This one we called "the Blob".
Southern Elephant Seal, Mirounga leoninaSouthern Elephant Seal, Mirounga leonina
When first ashore, older male animals are golden-brown to light-brown. The newly moulted  coat is dark grey. Females are generally darker brown. On younger animals the coat varies from light silvery-fawn to light grey-buff. At birth the pup is black. Breeding begins when adult males arrive on beaches in August, followed by the females a week later. Fighting than follows among the males to see who will be "beach master". Pups grow incredibly quickly, quadrupling their weight (the females milk is 50% fat) by the time they are weaned at 22 days of age. Their diet is predominantly squid, caught during very deep (below 1 km) and long dives.
nr.504
Southern Elephant Seal, Curverville Island, Antarctic. 
Southern Elephant Seal, Mirounga leonina
nr.535
This Crabeter Seal is taking a rest on the lava beach on Deception Island, Antarctic.
Circumpolar in pack ice
Length:  Male    3 Meters
                  Female 2.7 Meters
Crabeter Seal, Lobodon carcinopgagus
Crabeters actually eat krill, not crab as their name suggests. Their distribution is circumpolar, preferring 30-70 % pack ice. Although considered the worlds most abundant seal (about 30 million), the species habit of occurring in small family groups suggests smaller numbers when compared with the teeming breeding beaches occupied by fur seals. Not much is known about breeding in crabeters, which occurs among the pack ice during the austral spring. 
like southern elephant seals, pups grow very quickly and are weaned within two weeks. Crabeter seals have teeth that form a sieve to strain out Antarctic krill, their almost exclusive diet. Very little is known about this abundant animal (for example, copulation has never been observed), as pack ice is a difficult place for scientists to study these seals.


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