Elephant seals circle back to SLO County beaches. What are they up to?

April and May are the most crowded months on the beach at the Piedras Blancas elephant seal rookery north of San Simeon.

All the adult females – more than 5,000 in all – plus juveniles of both sexes, arrive for their annual molt. It’s ideal seal watching for every possible variation in coat color and scientific markings.

There are no adult bulls, though. Some of the young males show signs of growing that distinctive proboscis, but they are at least two years away from adulthood.

The mature bulls are on their post-breeding season migration, foraging to regain the weight they lost. They may have gone as long as 120 days without food.

The male elephant seals feed along the continental shelf on the Canadian and Alaskan coastline. They will return in July and August to molt their skin.

Molting season for elephant seals

The expanse of brown, tan and gray animals looks indistinguishable at first, but let your eyes get accustomed to the sight.

It’s like looking at jigsaw puzzle pieces. Gradually, contrasts emerge.

Shiny black seals are the marine mammals that just came out of the water. As they dry, their skin looks brown on their backs, tan on the underside.

The seals undergo the process of a catastrophic molt once a year.

As the old skin peels off, it reveals the new gray skin and brown coat beneath. As the hairs of the coat dry out, it acquires its brown color.

Compare how the molt happens on different seals. It starts around the eyes and other body orifices, and old scars.

Some seals are pockmarked with scars from cookie cutter sharks, a small shark that bites off distinctive circular plugs of blubber.

The elephant seals may look ratty, but it’s normal.

Seals arrive one by one on the beach, and start peeling off their skin within a couple of days. They spend about four weeks on the beach during April and May, so seals are at all stages of molting for the duration.

Friends of the Elephant Seal docents have samples of shed skin you can touch and handle.

As female elephant seals complete their molt, their embryos will begin to develop. They mated back in January and February after they finished nursing this year’s pups.

When the seals leave the beach this time, it will be for their long migration. They’ll be foraging in the ocean until January, when they return to the beach to have their pups.

Look for tags and marks

Cal Poly and UC Santa Cruz have research programs that involve identifying individual elephant seals so that their movements to other beaches can be recorded.

Look for marks and tags. If a blue-jacketed Friends of the Elephant Seal docent is around, report it to them.

If not, take pictures and send them to tags@elephantseal.org.

You’ll be asked for additional information – such as when and where you saw the seal – and your re-sighting will become part of the database.

This story was originally published April 27, 2022 at 5:05 AM.