Wild Facts

Photo from Wikimedia

Here we are at the beginning of another beautiful week. I hope you had nice weather this weekend and were able to enjoy that great autumn feel. In case the weather wasn’t the best for you this weekend, I figured we could take a trip to California where I am sure it will be nice and warm. Besides checking out the “Walk of Fame” we should also wander over to the ocean to see if we can catch a glimpse of the California Sea Lion. Okay, so we could probably check out this Sea Lion anywhere along the west coast but why not use this as an excuse to go to Cali, right?

You might recognize the California Sea Lion as this is typically the species you will see balancing a ball on their nose as they entertain a large crowd of kids and parents, alike. But the California Sea Lion is so much more than just a local attraction that amuses families. In their natural habitat these impressive creatures are capable of swimming at speeds around 40 km/hr (25 mph), making them among the sleekest and fastest of all the Sea Lions.

Photo by Andreas Bauer (Wikimedia)

Animals such as the squid, fish and shellfish need to constantly be on the look out for the California Sea Lion. Not only do they have to deal with the incredibly fast swimming speed, but this marine mammal is also proficient at diving. The California Sea Lion has no problems lowering their heart rate, which allows them to dive up to 10 minutes at a time. If this weren’t bad enough, this Sea Lion is known to hunt for up to 30 hours at a time. Basically, this makes life difficult for the aforementioned prey species.

California Sea Lion Fast Fact - Although, the California Sea Lion is perfectly suited to life in the water, they are surprisingly mobile on land as well. The rear flippers are able to rotate around making walking on land fairly easy. They probably aren’t going to win any races but this adaptation does allow them to get by.

Well that does it for the first Wild Fact of the week. I hope you enjoyed your trip to California and I will see you back here tomorrow.

Source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Elephant_seal_fight_Part-2.jpg

I hope everyone had a great weekend.  I know I sure did!  It was gorgeous in the Yukon and I enjoyed every minute of it.  Since it is Monday (well, Sunday night as I am writing this the night before) that means we need to get back to work.  I figured we would start the week off with an interesting animal called the Elephant Seal. It is similar to a regular seal but they have a much cooler snout and make awesome elephant-like noises.

The Elephant Seal is the largest of all the seals weighing in at about 900 kg (1900 lbs).  That is one heavy seal!  There are two species of elephant seals.  The Northern and Southern Elephant Seals.  I know, they are not very creative when deciding upon their names.  It is funny to think that the Northern Seals can be found in California which isn’t very northern if you ask me.  Although, when you compare them to the Southern seals which are usually found in Antarctica, I guess it is Northern.  For the record, these Southern Seals can weigh up to 4000 kg (8800 lbs) and I thought the 1900 lb seals were big.

The most interesting aspect of the Elephant Seal has to be their mating behaviour.  Yes I know their noses are interesting but it plays a role in mating so I will get to it in a second.   You see the mating patterns of the Elephant Seal are unique since only 5% of the males will be part of 90% of all the matings.  Mating for the males is a very rough sport as it usually involves fighting off other males.  This is the reason the necks of the elephant seal are very rough and strong (when fighting, they hit each other with their powerful necks).  Generally, the dominant and strong males will have a harem of female seals.  It is for this reason that they won’t actually mate until they are about 10 years old even though they are mature at 5 years of age.  I guess sites like Plenty of Fish are very ineffective for the Elephant Seal.  Life just isn’t fair when the Fabio Type seals are hogging all of the good women. I almost forgot to tell you how the noses play into all of this.  Well, the nose of the elephant seal can be inflated which makes it point towards the voice box. This allows the seal to make very loud noises which can be heard up to a mile away.  This obviously discourages other seals and is a sign of dominance.  See, I told you I would get to the interesting aspects of the odd looking seal nose.

Elephant Seal Fast Fact – Elephant seals were once hunted for their oil to the brink of extinction.  Due to the proper legislation their population is on the rebound.  Yay for Government Legislation.  And we thought the paperwork the Government makes you go through is for nothing.  This just goes to show that sometimes they know what they are doing!

All right, I am off now.  Have a great day!

It is time for another fact!  I want all of you to pay attention today since I will be asking for input on something at the end of this fact.  Anyone who answers will get one Wild Fact Bonus Point! I wanted to take a trip up north today and talk about the hooded seal.  More specifically, I wanted to talk about the male hooded seals since the females do not have this adaptation.  So what is the adaptation?  Well, adult male hooded seals are able to inflate a sac that can cover their head.  See, they have this pouch, which is an extension of their nasal cavity, that hangs down below their eyes and over their upper lip. By closing both nostrils and blowing the hooded seal has the ability to blow this ballon-like structure to a size similar to a basketball. Believe it or not this isn’t their only talent!  The males are also able to close off one nostril and blow this balloon out of their nose.  Could you imagine how great these animals would be for blowing up balloons at your kids 6th birthday party!

The million dollar question is why do the males have this adaptation? Sure it looks weird and would probably be fun to play with but is there something more to it? In a book by Judith E. King titled Seals of the World she observed the seals just floating around on the ice blowing up the balloons just to deflate them.  This seems like it might be something that entertains them.  I know if I had the ability to blow a balloon from my nose that I would constantly be taking advantage of this party trick!

To me a more reasonable explanation as to the purpose of these sacs has to do with social dominance.  They are similar to the massive racks on bull moose.  It is known that the male hooded seals will inflate these sacs if they are threatened and again to warn other seals to back off during mating season. So not only are they tons of fun but they also serve a purpose to warn off potential threats.

I promised that I would ask a question at the end of this fact so here it is.  What could these sacs be used for other than social dominance and just for fun? They may serve a purpose in the water, however, we hardly observe seals in the underwater world.  You will get a Wild Fact Bonus Point if you answer and the best answer gets an additional 5 Wild Fact Bonus Points.

Hooded Seal Fast Fact: The male hooded seal does not develop this special sac until they reach 4 years of age.