Abstract
THE grey seal (Halichærus grypus) is to be met with on many parts of the British coasts, from Orkney and Shetland, throughout the Hebrides, on the north and west coasts of Ireland, and occasionally on the south and east, on the coast of Wales, in the Wash, more rarely in the Solent, and as far south as Jersey (Zoologist, 1884, p. 337); hence greater opportunities for observing it, and learning something of its habits, have occurred than has been the case with the ringed, bearded, and hooded seals. Moreover, several observers have contributed information on its breeding habits and on the conditition of the young soon after birth. The following may be cited. So long ago as 1837, Mr. J. Wilson, writing on the habits of Scottish seals (Mag. Zool. and Bot., i. p. 539), states that the young of the grey seal is “born above high-water mark in the end of September or beginning of October, and is at first covered with white hair, which is retained for many weeks, but shed before it takes to the water.” His observations are confirmed by Edmondston, who, in his account of the seals of Shetland (“Zetland Isles,” vol. ii. p. 294), remarks of the grey seal that the young are brought forth in September, October, or November. Nilsson and some other writers who have followed him have expressed the opinion that the breeding season of this species is in February; and Bell, in an attempt to-explain this discrepancy (“Brit. Quad.,” 2nd edition, p. 267), has suggested that the milder climate of Britain permits of pairing taking place much earlier than in Scandinavia. From the united testimony, however, of other observers, there can be no doubt that this is a mistake, and that the breeding season is in the autumn. Prof. Collett, of Christiania, who some years since contributed an excellent paper on the grey seal to the Proceedings of the Zoological Society (1881, pp. 380–87), states that on the Fro Islands, off Trondhjem's Fiord, Norway, to which this species resorts in the breeding season, “the greater part give birth to their young in the last week of September, most usually on the 29th or 30th, or October 1—some a few days earlier and some later, but never after the middle of October.” He adds: “The seals probably begin to breed at the age of four years, or at the earliest three years, and give birth to only one young one annually. The young seal at its birth is clothed with a wool-like covering, which falls off after the lapse of a fortnight. … The pups pass the first three weeks of their life on land until they have shed their woolly coat, often on exactly the same spot where they have been born, and pass their time exclusively in receiving nourishment from the mother and in sleeping.”
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HARTING, J. On the Breeding Habits of the Grey Seal. Nature 57, 465–467 (1898). https://doi.org/10.1038/057465a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/057465a0