Week 17: Sa 17 February 2018, 19:34. Cape Shirreff, Livingston Island, Antarctica
After months of careful observations and thought, I’ve figured it out. Between Antarctic fur seals, penguins, and brown skuas, I know which animal’s offspring-rearing strategy is the most appealing.
Though penguins are diligent parents, they don’t offer their chicks any freedom. Their protection from skua predation is essential for the first 3-4 weeks of the chicks’ lives, but nests are really too small to fit 2 chicks and an adult by that point. Adults quit sitting on their ever-growing chicks around the 2 week point. From there on out their rock nests are broken down by the movement of adults in and out of the colonies, as well as the dynamics between the chicks and adults.
Well before the chicks start to creche, all of the adults and chicks have been standing awkwardly in an ever growing pool of “mud” for weeks. Everyone’s filthy and wet to some degree or other, and the whole colony smells worse than it has all season. Keep it classy, penguins. (Here’s looking specifically at you, chinstraps. You gentoos aren’t so bad, but what’s up with making your chicks chase you for meals? Brutal.)
The elimination of brown skuas from the running for best parenting strategy requires no explanation for one simple reason. Sometimes they simply eat their own chicks. That’s a very twisted version of Snack Time.
Because of the limited freedom of penguin chicks and the cannibalism of brown skuas of their own chicks, Antarctic fur seals are the clear winner of the Best Parenting Strategy amongst our study animals at Cape Shirreff. There are other reasons for fur seals being the clear victors, though.
Before working here I had very limited knowledge of fur seal biology; now I can provide a basic run-down on how the season plays out for them. The large, harem-holding bulls began showing up on our snow-covered beaches in early to mid November, and pregnant females started populating the beaches around the 3rd week of November. Shortly thereafter the females began giving birth to single pups.
During the weeks and months after giving birth, the pups were left on their own on the beaches while the mothers went out to sea on foraging trips. Trips ranged in duration from 3 to 7 days, on average. Initially the puppies spent their time sleeping and staying warm. As they grew older, they started forming puppy gangs that would hang out in snowmelt puddles on the beaches. Eventually they moved to exploring the shallow waters just off the beach, where they started swimming lessons. (They’d learned all about blowing bubbles in the ponds, so it was the logical next step.)
When they started playing in the water, we humans began worrying about their safety; their mothers, however, were frequently nowhere to be seen. While the puppies were learning how to spin and do flips in the intertidal pools, leopard seals were on the prowl in the waters just beyond. With the presence of leopard seals through the end of the season, it was a worrisome time. Every time I walked down Chungungo Beach, I waved the puppies out of the water and called, “Out of the water! Get out of there! It’s not safe! Yes, come hang out with me on the nice dry beach.”
Without their mothers’ presence, the puppies were also free to wander to lands beyond their birth beach. They visited neighboring beaches and started climbing to higher ground. When on shore the mothers would often take their pups onto hilltops for days of napping and nursing. Finding seals in the hills was initially strange, but I got used to it with time.
Finally, late in the season the puppies took to having pool parties in the puppy ponds: inland puddles and ponds with enough water for swimming. There they were able to practice their porpoising, swimming, bubble blowing, flipping, and being cute under the careful eye of a SAM – sub adult male – babysitter. What a life.
There you have it. How can you beat a parenting style that includes napping, cuddling, playing with your friends, swimming lessons, the freedom to explore, ample time to be on your own, and the knowledge that your mom will – fingers crossed – come home with a belly full of milk in a few days?
That’s better than sitting in a mudbath of poop or being eaten by mom and dad.
*Ahem. This was finished in the waters to the east of Tierra del Fuego. We’re almost back to trees – yay – and people – not yay.