Field Report: October 2019

Monthly Update: The Kauai team logged 258 seal sightings this month. This included 36 individually identified seals.

October: 258
September: 203
August: 324
July: 239
June: 179
May: 262
April: 348
March: 350
Feb: 303
Jan: 284

New:

• A new juvenile male seal was flipper tagged on the South Shore by the Kauai team. The seal’s ID is R1NI.
• Very pregnant AF R8HE spent two weeks on a North Shore beach. This seal is usually on Maui and Hawaii Island, and pupped on Maui in 2018. She has moved back to Oahu since. Her predicted pupping date was Nov 9.
• The annual monk seal count day occurred on Oct 19^th. Kauai had the most seals with 20 seals reported before noon. Three more seals hauled out later the day for a total of 23 different seals sighted on Kauai that day. The statewide (from Kauai to BI) total count was 50 seals.

Updates:

• PK6 born at Milolii in September is male, the mother is R400, the same female that has pupped at Milolii in Sept the past 2 years. The pup weaned on approximately Oct 31, resulting in 41-day nursing period. Tour boats and kayak companies are providing updates.
• S/F R7AA was seen with a small lump under the left jaw line on 8/31/19, it was possibly a small abscess. The seal was re-sighted on 10/21/19 in good health with no obvious abscesses on the jaw line.
• RH38, the seal rehabbed at KKO and released in July, continues to thrive on the North Shore.
• All of the 6 pups born this year have been sighted recently and continue to thrive.
• Displacements: A/F RK13 was displaced from the road edge at Fuji Beach, Kapaa at 3:00 am after calls from the police that the seal was on the road edge and in danger of being run over.
• Molting: 3 seals molted this month.
• Vaccinations: No vaccinations given this month.
• Bleach marking: Two seals were bleach marked this month, both are new untagged seals.

Research/Support of PIFSC:

• Sub-sampled scat, molt, and tissue plug samples accordingly.
• Logged all seal sightings for PIFSC database. Organized photos and reported sightings, molt tallies, survival factors to send to PIFSC.