360 Transactions. 



Art. XXXVIII. — The Crab-eating Seal in New Zealand. 



By W. E. B. Oliver, F.L.S., F.Z.S., Dominion Museum, Wellington. 



[Read before the Wellington Philosophical Society, 17th November, 1920 ; received by 

 Editor, 31st December, 1920 ; issued separately, 8th August, 1921.] 



Plate LVI. 



So far as I am aware, the crab-eating seal (Lobodou carcinophaga)* has 

 not hitherto been recorded in the New Zealand area, and I have therefore 

 to note the two following instances. In both cases the specimen or a 

 part of it has been preserved. 



In the Wanganui Museum there is a stuffed skin with the skull included. It 

 was stranded on the beach outside Wanganui Heads (S. lat. 39° 56') some 

 time previous to 1892, and was referred to Leptonychotes weddelli by Sir J. 

 Hector.f It is entirely white, with the dental formula C. f , I. i,M.| = 32. 



The second specimen, an aged female, was observed in April, 1916, off 

 Petone Beach (S. lat. 41° 14'), Wellington Harbour, where it remained 

 a few days. It was then captured and taken to the Newtown Zoo, but 

 died the following day. The skull is preserved in the Dominion Museum, 

 Wellington (Plate" LVI). 



The record of this species in New Zealand is especially interesting on 

 account of the great distance between the natural habitat of this seal, the 

 Antarctic pack-ice, and the few northern localities where stragglers have 

 been obtained. Besides the two specimens now recorded, stray examples 

 have been taken at San Sidro (S. lat. 34° 28'), north of Buenos Ayres ; at 

 Melbourne (S. lat. 37° 45'); and at Portland (S. lat, 38° 20'), Victoria. 

 The usual northern limit of the species is stated by Dr. Wilson to be 

 between 58° and 60° S. lat. It is found chiefly in the pack-ice of the 

 open sea, extending as far south as McMurdo Sound (S. lat. 77° 50'). It 

 is the common seal of the pack-ice, and is found all round the Antarctic 

 Circle. The occurrence of northern stragglers is, according to Dr. Wilson, 

 explained by the fact that large masses of ice drift up into more northern 

 waters from the south, no doubt very often with seals on them. But in 

 this connection may be mentioned the following remark by Dr. Wilson}: 

 " Certain it is that Lobodon, notwithstanding its pelagic habit of life, tends 

 to wander great distances at the approach of death, and to extraordinary 

 heights up the glaciers of South Victoria Land." 



The crab-eating seal is easily recognized, notwithstanding the variation 

 in its colour, by the nature of the teeth. The molars have each a large 

 lobe with a small lobe in front and two or three behind, the lobes being 

 slightly recurved and the spaces between them deep. Quoting from 

 Dr. Wilson again,§ " The use of the extraordinary development of the lobes 

 of the post-canine teeth in this seal was suggested by Captain Barret 

 Hamilton in an article on the seals of the Southern Cross collection. 

 These lobes, as he pointed out, form a sieve when the jaws are closed, 

 through which the water can be ejected from the mouth, while the mud 

 and crustaceans are retained and swallowed." 



* Hombkon and Jacquinot, Phoca, Voy. Pole Sud, t. 10, 1842. 

 t Trans. N.Z. Inst., vol. 25, p. 258, 1893. 



$ Appendix II to Scott's Voyage of the "Discovery," p. 476, 1905. 

 §Nat. Ant. Exped., Zool, vol. 2, p. 34, 1907. 



