For the last few weeks, Grey Seals have been giving birth to doe eyed pups in nearby geo’s – an inlet or gully in the face of a cliff. There are two species of seal in Orkney, the Grey and the Common. Greys are larger and favour more exposed coasts. The shore of the sheltered bay below the meadow here is home to a small bob of Common Seals, but out on the headlands, and in the wilder spots, the larger Grey is much more likely to be seen. The two are easy to tell apart, the Common seal has a rounded cat like face, the face of the Grey is longer, with an elongated muzzle, a “roman nose”.
Unlike Common Seals that in Orkney pup quite sensibly in June, Greys choose the wilder winter months. On Hoy they start to give birth in late October. By mid November, local geo’s will be host to dozens of dozing pups and watchful mothers.
Care has to be taken when approaching the seals, the mothers, if spooked, can quickly panic and toboggan back into the sea, squashing all before them. The rule is to walk slowly and quietly to the edge of the geo, and if an adult makes eye contact, back away just as quietly. For photography, a telephoto lens is essential. All the photographs here were taken from the cliff tops.
Once born the pups growth seems almost exponential. On a diet of milk that is 50% fat, the pups will, in a few short weeks, grow from around 12kg in weight at birth, to 50kg at 3-4 weeks old, a gain of up to 2kg per day.
With growth comes the moult, the pups start to shed their white coats at around two to three weeks old, a process that will take around three weeks to complete. Unlike Common Seals, who moult whilst still in the womb and can swim at a day old, grey seal pups need to moult before they are sea worthy. Moulting pups are easy to spot, the ground around them dusted white with cast off fur. As adults they’ll moult once a year, in Spring.
Generally the geo’s are a scene of calm, mothers and pups snoozing the day away on a bed of rock or sea rounded cobbles, protected from any discomfort by a thick layer of blubber.
But there’s death as well as life of course. In one geo a small white body bobbed in the surf, watched from a nearby outcrop by a pair of Black-backed Gulls, waiting for the tide to recede and give them their meal. In the early days of life a few will always be lost but the most imminent threat is the weather. In 2021, on a Scottish reserve, storm Arwen took over 800 pups. This year though, despite a few days of wild seas courtesy of storm Bert, losses, at least locally, seem to be few and far between. By mid December most of the pups will have moulted, greatly reducing the risk of loss.
I’ve visited the same geo’s a half dozen times through November, seeing not just the pups but other wildlife as well. At this time year there’ll be Greylag and Barnacle Geese grazing the headland, on the shore Rock Pipits will be seen in numbers along with the occasional Snow Bunting. Rarer visitors may also blow in, last week, feeding in the shallows of a small pool, a Great White Egret was seen. Sods law dictating that on that particular day, I’d chosen not to take a camera because the light was so flat and overcast.
Orkney folklore tells of another breed of seal, the Selkie, the largest of all. Said to be able to shed their skins and shape shift into the human form. A local story tells of a man who stole the skin of a beautiful selkie woman and took her for his wife, she came to love him but loved the sea more. She bore him seven children but one day while her man was at sea, she found her hidden coat. Kissing her children goodbye she returned to the sea, seeking out her husbands boat to bid him a final farewell before slipping under the waves….
A garden in Orkney 
Good morning, Gary, Aaaaaah! Sooo cute. Get seals down here often, together with dolphins, often, and whales, occasionally. A few Summers ago I was swimming in the sea with a friend and felt a nudge on my shoulder. Thought it was my friend, but no, it was “Sammy” the local seal star! Have had torrential, big wind and now cold, cold, predicted. Weather getting strange. Have a good week. xx
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Hello Margot, aren’t they just, although saying that a few years ago we cut some net from the neck of a half grown seal, doe eyes and seriously big teeth. I read a while ago about a seal who had learnt to leave the harbour, cross the road and visit the local fishmongers for treats.
Much colder here as well, bitter today. One of those days where it’s better to be inside looking out.
Have a good week.
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Love that seal!
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We get several types of seals here on the coast, but none as beautiful as your fluffy pups!
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Totally unrelated to your post, Gary, but we’ve just watched this new piece from one of Time Team about Orkney:
New Episode | Saving Swandro | Time Team Plus Swandro – Orkney Coastal Archaeology Trust
Totally fascinating to me, and though I’m sure you know about this dig already, I wondered if the exciting possible find of a Neolithic burial chamber shown at the end of the piece has been reported yet. Perhaps my excitement about early finds like this is just part of Orkney everyday normal for you who are lucky enough to live there.
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Hello Penny, thank you for the link, it’s on our watch list for next week. We’ve been to Rousay, aka the Egypt of the North, and have visited the cairn and broch at Midhowe but due to ferry times couldn’t quite get as far as Swandro, which is further along the coast, we did get as far as Skaill farm, passing the Wirk and St Mary’s on the way, see the link, we’ll have to revisit and stay over on the island. It is everyday here but we share the same excitement, you never get tired of the landscape and history.
https://www.discoverrousay.co.uk/historyandarchaeology.shtml
Rousay itself reminds me very much of Hoy, quite a bit smaller but as with Hoy an island of low hills with settlements and houses strung out along the coast.
A while ago we also visited Wyre, which is a five minute journey from Rousay and has a population of 5, an idyllic day watching the world go by and hoping the afternoon ferry didn’t forget us.
https://www.northlinkferries.co.uk/orkney-blog/our-trip-to-wyre/
As with the people who wrote the blog above, we were the only two, plus a tractor, to get off the ferry. A beautiful spot.
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Thanks for the links, Gary, both full of interesting prehistory insight and pictures. I knew Orkney was dense archaeological sites, but had no idea it was that dense!
Guess my fascination with archaeology in general and Scottish archaeology in particular comes from being taken to Dun Beag broch on Skye by my English boyfriend (soon after, husband) back in 1989. We bonded over our awe for the sophistication of the building using only the stone, clay and bone at hand and the obvious complexity of society at the time.
The archeology here is just as old, but the finds much more ephemeral and there’s very little to see, because the building material and tools were mainly wood:
Archeological find affirms Heiltsuk Nation’s oral history | CBC News
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Hello Penny, we stayed on Skye in the mid 1990’s and visited Dun Beag, we went in late October/early November and stayed for three weeks, even at that time of year we still managed a few midge bites! I’d done some research around what to photograph but hadn’t realised quite how big Skye was, I seem to remember a fifty mile drive from our digs to a spot called Elgol.
If I could have one power it would be x-ray vision, it would be amazing to see the stuff that’s hidden beneath our feet.
Thank you for the link, 14,000 years ago predates Orkney, I think people have been here for around 9000 years, amazing that that held up sliver of wood had survived at all. It’s often the same in many parts of the UK, anything built of wood or earth leaves precious little in the way of clues.
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We live just next to the biggest grey colony in the UK. More than 25.000 grey seals come here in the winter between November and January, having around 10.000 pups. Here is our Christmas card with a seal pup
The Fab Four of Cley
🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂
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