The Mysterious Lives of Northern Elephant Seals

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California beaches are swamped with chaos every year. Mothers keep their young close as they navigate across what little bit of sand is unoccupied. The waves rise, crash and retreat amidst a figurative sea of countless individuals making themselves known and showing off. After all, they've spent months preparing for this coveted time on the coastline.

They look their best and want everyone to know it. It's noisy, and the dissonance swells as one conversation tries to overpower another. Two males, who arrived at the beach early to get a good spot, start to swear off over who should get to introduce themselves to a female off to their right first.

A fight ensues, and others look on as the two battle it out with elaborate displays of physical power. The female, who can't be bothered with either one of them, sighs and detests. The smaller of the two males finally secedes, sulking, defeated and quietly determined to do better next time. Oh wait, maybe I should clarify. Despite the roaring similarities between this story and one you may have already experienced in real life at the height of summer. Among humans, I'm talking about the largest pinniped species in the Northern hemisphere, the northern elephant seal.

Like most large, ocean-dominant mammals of the 18th century, we humans gave them a run for their money. Similar to whales, northern elephant seals contained something valuable—blubber. From blubber came oil, and from oil came soap, leather, candles, cosmetics and fuel for oil lamps. The species was so over-harvested that it was thought to be extinct by 1884, until a remnant population was discovered nearly ten years later. Since then, northern elephant seals have rebounded and colonies have sprung up in places like Point Reyes National Seashore and Channel Islands National Park. Intriguing visitors and continuously surprising the scientists who study them.

I'm Jason Epperson. And on this week's episode of America's National Parks, we'll be navigating the excitingly mysterious life of the northern elephant seal.

Elephant seals are part of a group of mammals called pinnipeds. These consist of species like the California Sea, lion, walrus and gray seal. The word pinniped literally means feather-footed, which isn't too inaccurate a name considering the look of their flippers. Elephant seals belong to the pinniped family of true seals and consist of two subspecies, the northern and southern elephant seal. We'll be focusing on the former. Which are found in the North Pacific, ranging from Baja California, Mexico to the Gulf of Alaska and Aleutian islands, with breeding grounds along the coastline.

So what makes elephant seals a true seal? Well, unlike their often confused with counterparts the sea, lion and fur seal, elephant seals are earless. In place of external ear flaps are two pin-sized and nearly invisible holes. Elephant seals are also unable to rotate their hind flippers. This makes the walking behavior observed in species like sea lions impossible.

Instead, elephant seals must use considerable effort to flex their spines, lift their chests up, and retract their foreflippers to pull their bodies forward. The name for this movement is called galumphing, and it looks exactly like it sounds at best. An elephant seal can hit top-notch speeds of 5 miles an hour on land, and only if their life is in danger. If you've never seen an elephant seal, your mind might be swirling with what one looks like. Based on the name alone, elephant seals owe their name to the large proboscis that hangs from the male's head.

Though not nearly as long. The similarities between the proboscis of a male elephant seal and the trunk of an elephant were enough for the name to stick. Both male and female elephant seals have elongated, robust bodies with thick necks, large eyes and whiskers. The English writer Jenny Diskey once described them as grey-jellied mountains lining the seashore. But that's pretty much where the similarities between males and females end. Otherwise, the two sexes exhibit clearly different physical traits, a concept called sexual dimorphism.

Despite this being common in most species, elephant seals take it to a whole other level. Not only do males have a large appendage hanging from their heads, they also have enlarged canine teeth. And something called a dermal shield, a sheet of keratinized skin covering their chest and throat. All three of these characteristics are thought to have evolved as a result of sexual selection. Elephant seals are highly polygynous, meaning that male members of the species establish harems to gain access to and mate with multiple females. It's one of the most competitive breeding systems on the planet.

Winning at this kind of game requires size and strength. Physically, bigger males have a size advantage over smaller males, and larger. Canine teeth mean deeper bites. Not only does a stronger dermal shield better withstand those bites, but it also better absorbs physical blows from an opponent. And, meanwhile, a proboscis serves as an undeniable signal to others. I'm bigger, I'm better, I'm stronger.

Females invest a significant amount of energy in carrying, birthing and raising young, although female elephant seal moms can be a bit harsh. —more on that later. Having clear indicators that a particular male has high-quality genetics allows a female to be picky and improve the chances that her young will survive. She's looking for big teeth, a tough dermal shield, prominent proboscis, and large body. And large they are.

Adult male northern elephant seals weigh in at 3,300 to 8,200 pounds, the largest way more than my Ford F-350 pickup truck. And the males are three to seven times heavier than their female counterparts.

The massive size of the bull elephant seal is what made it so lucrative, though not specifically targeted at first. Whalers in the 18th century noted that elephant seals were relatively easy to catch and full of the same blubber as whales. One male elephant seal could yield as much as 210 gallons of oil. The demand for blubber reached a fever pitch in the mid-1800s. When the gold rush brought an influx of people to the western part of the country, the demand for oil skyrocketed.

By 1865, elephant seals were noted as being few and far between and were considered extinct by 1884.

The Smithsonian started sending expeditions out in the late 1800s in an effort to find remnant populations. Sure enough, eight individuals were found on Guadalupe Island, off the western coast of Mexico. Eight wasn't a lot, but it signaled hope for the species, right? Not according to the conservation science practices of the 1800s.

The expedition team promptly killed seven of them, finding them more valuable to secure as museum specimens and part of personal collections. An ode to the species that once was. Thankfully, those eight weren't the only northern elephant seals on Guadalupe Island, and the expedition crew didn't find the others. Elephant seals started popping up off the coast of Mexico in the early 1900s, in increasing numbers, the resiliency of mother nature was about to show up in full force, knowing what was almost lost. Protective legislation was put in place by Mexico in 1922..

Mexico has generally been ahead of the United States in protecting sea creatures. Once elephant seals were found in southern California waters, the United States did the same. In the 1930s, northern elephant seals slowly but surely started returning to the California coastline to breed. They showed up on Año Nuevo Island in 1961, Southeast Farallon Island in 1972, Point Reyes in Cape San Martin in 1981 and San Simeon in 1992..

State and federal agencies, including the National Park Service, knew that they had something special to protect. But protecting a species requires knowing something about it. And when it came to northern elephant seals, we didn't even know how long they lived. Researchers and park staff took on the high order to observe, collect data and make management decisions, resulting in a plethora of knowledge gained. Scientists now have data spanning five decades, and over 8,000 female northern elephant seals have been tracked. On Año Nuevo alone. What we've learned overall is that northern elephant seals are more incredible than we ever could have imagined.

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Northern elephant seals are the only mammal known to make two migration trips per year, meaning they return to the shoreline twice, albeit for two different purposes. Younger, sexually mature adult males start to go lump out of the water around the middle of November. For breeding season. Seal breeding grounds are called rookeries. And less dominant males arrive early to hunker down before older males show up. In December. Adult females also show up in December. A record 1,371 breeding females were counted on Point Reyes National Seashore during the 2021-2022 season, making for some very busy beaches.

Each rookery is comprised of its own unique colony, all of which are descended from the founder colony on Guadalupe Island. New colonies are occasionally established as population numbers grow and some males show up to the rookeries. They weren't born at inserting themselves into the pre-existing mix. Interestingly, the calls of male northern elephant seals were once unique to specific colonies. It was first noted in the late 1960s, as researchers began scrambling to study the species. The pulse rates, or tempo, of male calls, varied from one colony to another, with some being slower than others.

But as populations expanded and males were forced to seek out breeding opportunities in other colonies, these dialects were lost. Studies from the late 60s and early 70s revealed that males retained their individual signature calls throughout their lives. And thus, the overall tempos of specific colonies changed as new males immigrated in. By the early 2010s, none of the original pulse rates could be assigned to any particular colony. But individual male vocalizations had become much more complex, suggesting that competition between males for mating rights to females had increased through the decades. Females start giving birth to pups from the breeding season the year before, in late December. Pups weigh about 75 pounds at birth, but after being nursed for only a month, they tip the scales at closer to 400.

During this month-long nursing period, females mate with dominant males. A highly successful breeding bull will father anywhere from 20 to 50 pups in one season. The vast majority of males won't mate, but nearly every female will. Between breeding, defending territory, birthing and caring for pups, elephant seals don't have time to eat and depend on stored blubber for energy. This means that females need to make a quick exit back to the ocean to fill their reserves after they birthed, weaned and mated.

They leave their pups, now called weaners, behind, having not even taught them to swim or forage. That's something they'll have to figure out on their own over the next two months. Males eventually clear out by the middle of March, and by the time they leave, they're about half the weight they were when they arrived. Weaners stick around a little longer, learning the ropes before they venture into the ocean by the end of March.

Adult females return from their foraging trip and galumph back onto the beach for a second time. From April to May, juveniles follow suit from May to June, and adult males from June to August. Why back so soon to Molt? That's right, Northern elephant seals molt.

Not only that, they undergo something that's called a catastrophic or radical molt. Most mammals shed their skin and hair year-round, but northern elephant seals save this for one select time of the year. The first layer of skin and fur comes off as new skin and fur replaces it, seals. Then quickly return to the water for their second migration of the year soon after, this migration is a longer one, lasting about eight months instead of two.

The next time northern elephant seals are on land, it will be breeding time at the rookery. time on land for northern elephant seals is brief. They spend 80-90 of their lives in open sea, which was one of the reasons we once knew so little about them. Efforts to start satellite monitoring in the 1980s were hindered by the lack of time that northern elephant seals spend on the ocean's surface and the limited ability of satellites to collect data points. Fortunately, advances in biotelemetry technology, or methods in how animals are tracked, have allowed scientists to study their ocean-going behavior in remarkable detail.

By 2004, University of California Santa Cruz researchers had access to satellite transmitters that allowed them to collect data on a seal's location. Swim speed, dive duration and depth, along with sea temperature and salinity every eight seconds. By 2010, data from almost 300 females were collected. Every year, the research team sedates 40-60 females, attaches transmitters to them, sends them off on their way, and then downloads the data from the transmitter when the females return. Transmitters are typically set in a white, plaster-like base and then glued to the seal's back or head using epoxy.

This is harmless to the seal and makes it easy for researchers to spot individuals with trackers in the crowd. Looking for those who appear to have little hats and backpacks on them. These studies, along with others, have had some pretty incredible results. Namely, that female northern elephant seals have an internal GPS system that is so accurate. They navigate the same approximately 10,000-kilometer trip each year with eerie precision. Female elephant seals don't migrate in groups, so migration routes and decision-making are done on an individual basis. They may congregate in an area rich with preferred food items like squid, fish, small sharks and octopus, but each goes on their way shortly thereafter. They all have unique migration routes, but the year-after-year completion of the route is highly consistent.

One female, tracked for consecutive years, followed the same route, only veering from the path taken years before by the length of a football field. Some go to Alaska, some go to Japan, and yet they all return to the same rookery within a week or two of each other. Traveling up to 150 kilometers a day to beat the clock and make it back to the breeding ground. This is likely a skill they're born with. If successful at getting into the ocean, a wiener's navigational ability, similarly, seems to be second nature. And what females do or don't do along that journey is also pretty incredible.

Predators of the elephant seal include great white sharks and killer whales. It's a big, scary ocean out there. But females simply forage deeper than their predators, at about 650 feet below the water's surface, to avoid them. Altogether, one female was clocked at diving 1,754 meters, that's well over a mile.

Research has shown that males have the same ability. With one diving 1,580 meters, they can hold their breath for up to two hours, but routine dives typically last about 20 to 80 minutes. The sperm whale is the only species that dives deeper and longer.

Dives also happen continuously. One female monitored for 34 days, dove the entire time only resting at the water's surface for about three minutes in between. It's thought the northern elephant seals may snooze while gliding on the dive down, but it's a guess at best. Data thus far suggests that northern elephant seals are fairly adaptable and may be able to overcome challenges associated with climate change, human encroachment and loss of habitat. Scientists were at once doubtful of this ability because all current northern elephant seals are descended from the very few that were left in the late 1800s.

This created what's called a genetic bottledeck. With a high loss of individuals comes a high loss of genetic diversity, requirement for species adaptation and plasticity. Thankfully, northern elephant seals seem to be doing quite alright. As of the 1980s, scientists estimated that the northern elephant seal population came in at 120,000 individuals. It's now estimated at over 150,000.

Populations in California are continuously growing, at about 6 a year, and are starting to establish breeding grounds on beaches that were once commonly visited by guests of Point Reyes National Seashore.

You can see these incredible animals for yourself in winter, late spring and summer, with some juveniles showing up on the shoreline in the fall. Elephant Seal Cove overlook in Channel Islands National Park offers views of the species during breeding season and the catastrophic Molt chimney. Rock on Point Reyes National Seashore also has an elephant seal overlook for visitors. A testimony to the resilience of the wild in the face of human persecution. The near loss of the Northern elephant seal continues to serve as a reminder of just how important research, conservation management, habitat protection and entities like the National Park Service really are.

This episode of America's National Parks was written by Dr. Charlotte Hacker. Peter Shen is the author of our theme music and our audio editor, and I'm your host, Jason Epperson. If you enjoyed the show, please consider leaving us a rating and a review. If you're new here, make sure to subscribe to the podcast to get new episodes delivered to your feed.

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