On September 21, 2020, we settled with some fellow photographers, in Isla Escondida, located about 80 km from Trelew Chubut Patagonia Argentina.
Southern Hemisphere’s spring is the time of births and new mating of sea elephants in the area and being in a pandemic, and without being able to travel since all outings and therefore photography congresses planned in different parts of the country were suspended, the Island was our only refuge and destination to shoot.
We woke before dawn and headed to the coast where one of the largest elephant harems is located. In the middle of the morning, I found myself in front of a group of females, I was struck by a female who would not stop moving, she was very restless, that was the moment that I realized that she was about to give birth.
It was at that moment that she lifted her tail and I saw to my amazement and surprise that her baby’s head poked out.
I did not know whether I should begin photographing. I took my camera and started to shoot, to share and spread the wonder of nature, a new life in the middle of the pandemic.
ABOUT THE SPECIES:
The Southern Elephant Seal is the largest of the seals, with males weighing around 3.5 tonnes and up to 5.5 meters long, while the females are smaller, 900 kg and less than three meters long.
Elephant seals breed mainly on the subantarctic islands and in the Valdes Peninsula and adjacent coastal sectors of the Chubut province, which is the only continental breeding area outside of Antarctica and one of the largest.
Elephant Seals are the largest of the pinnipedios. Its body is plump and obese, the head is robust, with large eyes and it has relatively short pectoral fins. It presents a marked sexual dimorphism. The adult male can be up to five times heavier than the female and has a remarkable proboscis, which is an enlargement of the nasal passages and is fully developed at eight years of age, when the male begins to compete for the females. In a relaxed position, the trunk is hanging in front of the muzzle, but during a fight it is inflated by the action of the exhaled air and by muscular movements, acting as a resonance chamber for the sounds produced in the mouth. The coloration in both sexes is quite variable, both between individuals and in the same specimen during the year; in general, it ranges from bright gray to brown, somewhat lighter on the belly. The skin on the chest and neck of the adult male is very thickened and cracked and presents a large number of scars as a result of territorial fights with other males. When the puppy is born it is black, but after the first molt, at three or four weeks of age, it turns silvery-gray with an exceptionally light belly.
Habitat:
Circumpolar cold seas. During the breeding and molting season, it lives on sandy or gravel beaches, avoiding rough coasts exposed to the waves.
Customs: Throughout the year it alternates short periods on land, for reproduction and molting, with others for feeding in the water, spending approximately 75% of the year sailing in the open sea. At the end of the reproductive season, in early summer and after a long fast, the adults return to the sea to feed. In late summer or early fall they return to the beaches to shed their fur. Non-reproductive specimens molt in late spring. During this period, they are always on land, fasting and at the end they return to the sea. On land it moves slowly and somewhat clumsily by undulations of the trunk. In the water, on the other hand, it moves with agility. He is an excellent diver, with dives that last on average between 20 and 30 minutes and can reach 800 meters in depth, although dives of more than 1,200 meters that exceeded two hours in duration have been recorded. It feeds mainly on squid and octopus and to a lesser extent on fish and crustaceans.
Reproduction: The males arrive on the coast approximately from August and during the entire reproductive season, which lasts for about 90 days, they remain fasting, losing more than 12 kg of weight per day. In order to establish a dominance hierarchy within the colony, adult males compete with each other aggressively; they face upright, snapping at the neck and head, emitting powerful roars that can be heard hundreds of meters away. Harems vary in size from a few dozen to several hundred females, with only one male or a few dominant males controlling the harem and succeeding in copulating. The females arrive on the beaches between September and October; on the fifth day of arrival, they give birth to a calf conceived in the previous season after a gestation of almost a year.
The cub at birth is 1.30 m tall and weighs 40 kg and is suckled for about 23 days. From the moment she arrives at the beach and during the lactation period, the female is fasting and loses nine kg per day. Mother’s milk is very rich in fat and during lactation the puppy gains five kg per day. After weaning, the females are fertilized and after a few days they leave the beaches. The cubs spend a period of fasting on land for one to three months and then go out to sea in search of their first solid food. Females reach sexual maturity at four years and males at 6 years, but these rarely reproduce before 10 years of age. The maximum longevity is 15 years for the male and 20 years for the female.
