466 



NATURE 



[March 17, 1898 



states that on the Fro Islands, ofT 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 i — 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 wherfe they have been born, and pass their time 

 exclusively in receiving nourishment from the mother 

 and in sleeping." 



As to the length of time the woolly coat is retained, 

 some difference of opinion has been expressed. Prof. 

 Collett, as above stated, believes that it is shed in about 

 a fortnight, or between a fortnight and three weeks ; 

 and he derived his information from Mr. F. Borthen, 

 the proprietor of the Fro Islands, who furnished him on 



Fig. I.— Young Grey Seal shortly after birth. 



several occasions with particulars concerning the seals 

 during their stay at this group of islands. Mr. J. Wilson, 

 already mentioned, states, somewhat vaguely, that the 

 woolly coat is retained for many weeks. Dr. R. Ball, 

 who furnished so much information to William Thomp- 

 son, of Belfast, for his work on the natural history of 

 Ireland, writing of the grey seal {Trans. Roy. Irish 

 Acad.., vol. viii.) has observed more precisely that the 

 very young females are generally "of a dull yellowish 

 white, with rather long hair which falls off in about six 

 "Weeks after birth, and gives place to a shorter and more 

 shining coat of a warm dingy yellow, variously blotched 

 with blackish grey, the whole gradually becoming more 

 dull, and a general dark shade spreading over the back 

 as the animal advances in age." 



On December 24, 1881, one of the Trinity pilots, whilst 

 off the Long Sand in the Lynn Roads, saw a large seal 

 watching over the dead carcase of a recently born young 

 one. On attempting to capture the old one she im- 

 mediately showed fight, and had to be killed before she 

 could be secured. This animal measured seven feet in 



NO. 148 1, VOL. 57] 



length and five feet nine inches in girth behind the fore- 

 flippers. It was identified as a grey seal by Mr. 

 Thomas Southwell, of Norwich, who, in giving an 

 account of the circumstance {Zoologist., 1882, p. 187), 

 described the young one as being "of a beautiful 

 silvery white, the muzzle sooty grey, a slight tinge of 

 the same colour being visible on the back of the head, 

 and for some distance along the spine." 



The appearance presented by the young grey seal 

 shortly after birth is well shown in the accompanying 

 illustrations (Figs, i and 2), from photographs taken by 

 Mr. Henry Evans, of Jura, during a visit to the Haskeir 

 Rock in the Hebrides. Haskeir is a small rock about 

 twelve miles west of North Uist. It is a great resort of 

 grey seals, which breed there in October and November. 

 It was formerly the custom with fishermen to visit this 

 rock during the time it was frequented by the seals, and 

 to kill them with clubs for the sake of their skins ; but 

 it is satisfactory to know, on the authority of Mr. Henry 

 Elwes {The Ibis, 1869, p. 25), that this practice was 

 put a stop to some years ago by Sir John Orde, the 

 proprietor of the island. 



From the foregoing remarks it 

 will be evident that the suggestion 

 (p. 346) that "the white coat is 

 not improbably shed in utero"\s not 

 borne out by the testimony of the 

 writers quoted. Nor is it only with 

 the grey seal that this curious state 

 of things exists. Dr. R. Brown, 

 writing of the seals of Greenland 

 (Proc. Zool. Soc, 1868), states that 

 the Greenland seal (or harp seal, 

 as it is sometimes termed from the 

 peculiar distribution of dark colour 

 on the back) brings forth two young 

 at a birth ; that the pup " retains its 

 white woolly coat for a fortnight or 

 three weeks, and, like the grey seal, 

 it refuses to enter the water until 

 this is lost." Confirmation of this 

 is to be inferred from the remark of 

 Prof. Collett {I.e.), that the young 

 grey seals during the first three 

 weeks of their lives on land are " by 

 no means so strictly confined to a 

 dry place of rest, as is the case with 

 the harp seal, which, so far as we 

 know, never enters the water volun- 

 tarily in its woolly coating^ 



As to the common seal {Phoca 

 vitulina), which pairs in September, 

 and produces a single young one — sometimes two — 

 in the month of June, it will not be irrelevant to 

 refer here to the condition of the young at birth. A 

 few years ago, towards the end of May, the late Mr. 

 A. D. Bartlett purchased of a dealer in Liverpool four 

 adult common seals, which were carefully transported to 

 the Zoological Gardens. On June 9, one of them gave 

 birth to a young one, whose appearance is thus de- 

 scribed by Mr. Bartlett {Zoologist, 1881, p. 383): "It 

 was covered with a rather thick coat of hair ; its eyes 

 very bright and wide open ; it turned and rolled about, 

 divesting itself of the outer covering of hair, which 

 formed a complete mat upon which the young animal 

 lay. For the first hour or two after its birth it was very 

 active, and within three hours after its birth was swim- 

 ming and diving about in the water like an adult animal. 

 It uttered a low soft bah, or single call note, and looked 

 about after its mother, and crawled towards her when 

 she came out of the water. The mother would turn upon 

 her side to let the young one suck. The latter was 32 

 inches long, and weighed 20 lbs. at its birth." 



