Solent Seal Tagging Project

An exciting new project is taking place this year to increase our knowledge of common seals in the Solent and Eastern English Channel. The main leads in the project will be the Wildlife Trusts South East Marine Programme and Chichester Harbour Conservancy (the latter is the site of a small resident population of common seals). The first step has been to collate all the currently existing seal sightings from various sources including my records as Sussex County Recorder for Sea Mammals. Common Seals have recently been made a Biodiversity Action Plan Species because of their numbers in the UK have declined dramatically in recent years.

A small population of approximately 15 - 20 harbour seals live in the Solent area and are considered regionally unique and therefore very important. Very little is known about the Solent seals, their resting, feeding and breeding sites remain a mystery. With out a knowledge of these important sites, little can be done to ensure they are protected for the benefit of the seals. Transient seals seen in East Sussex, sometimes entering the river systems of the Adur and Ouse, may come from this Solent population.

As part of this project, 5 of the seals were tagged in March using the latest seal monitoring equipment. The tagging operation was undertaken by the world leaders in seal tagging, the Sea Mammal Research Unit (SMRU), under a Government approved licence. The tags will remain on the seals until they moult in July / August time. Previous tagging operations have been very successful and seal behaviour has not been affected as a result. The tags will transmit using mobile phone networks and will give information on location, dive depth, dive duration and periods spend resting on land.

As part of this project I have been developing an outreach programme which will be delivered to local school. I was able to go along on the first day of tagging to observe and take pictures for the outreach programme. First hand observations and tagging data show that the seals are behaving as normal and that their behaviour has not been affected at all.

(A porpoising seal leads the way)

We are also hoping over the next year to build up a photo identification library which we can use to identify individual seals (unique markings) and monitor their movements.

Brighton Science Festival 2009

I attended the Brighton Science Festival again this year with a joint display with the Friends of Shoreham Beach Nature Reserve (FoSB). The Shoreham Beach Display included information about the Reserve and FoSB activities, events and achievements. A large part of the display was taken up by a marine litter display "Turning the Tide on marine Litter" and a display of marine litter including the time it takes for each item to biodegrade. (See below)

We shared the room with another display about creating art from marine litter.

My display focused on sea mammals again this year, particularly dolphins and seals, both of which have been recorded at Shoreham.

As well as UK and Sussex Cetaceans (Whales, Dolphins and Porpoise) the display included information about local seal sightings and a satellite tagging programme on Solent and South East Channel Seals.

I will be involved in this project as Sussex County Recorder for Sea Mammals and to develop an education pack to accompany the project. I hope to be able to provide updates on this project in future entries.

A major focal point for my display was the life sized inflatable bottlenose dolphin. This year I also ran three demonstrations in the demonstration hall, the scenario for the demonstration was a re-enactment of a dolphin rescue with audience participation.

Dolphins may be stranded for many reasons so I chose a different scenario for each demonstration, one of them being entangled in marine litter debris, which again linked to the FoSB display. About 100,000 marine mammals, seabirds and turtles are killed by debris each year.

Moving the dolphin from the display room to the demonstration room was a difficult operation, avoiding people and navigating along various narrow corridors.

The demonstration started with a introduction to dolphin adaptation and anatomy, as this is knowledge the audience would need to know to affect a rescue.

The demonstration followed the series of things one should do to help give first aid e.g. check it is breathing (how often!), keep it wet (dolphins can very quickly die of heat exhaustion), dig holes around the flippers if possible to alleviate the damage that gravity causes (dolphins can’t swim if they damage their flippers) and so on (see above)

The re-enactment also demonstrated how a dolphins adaptations to aquatic life work against them if they become stranded on land.

Being a demonstration involving children, each scenario has a happy ending. The dolphin was helped back into the sea and walked around until it was able to swim unaided. But in reality, even after much effort, a happy ending is not guaranteed.

Stranded Porpoise

Yet another dead stranded porpoise has been washed ashore near Worthing in West Sussex, yesterday afternoon. It was an adult common porpoise, partly decomposed. It is worrying that we have now had 3 reported in the same area over the last two months.

Another stranded porpoise

I have just heard, via the Sea Watch Foundation that another porpoise has stranded at Worthing, on Sunday 21st December. The porpoise was fairly decomposed.

Newpaper article "Lancing Herald" regarding the previous pospoise stranding discussed in my earlier entry.

Winter storms and stranded marine life

Following the recent storms, large number of dead and dying starfish have been washed up on local Sussex beaches along with other animals inlcuding crabs and dogfish. I have had reports from the Shoreham Beach Local Nature Reserve and Worthing Beach. The strandings at Worthing included a harbour porpoise. The report came initially from a local animal rescue charity WADARS via the Sussex Wildlife Trust. The porpoise was estimated to be able 1.7 metres and was very emaciated.

Initially it was thought the two events were not related, as winter storms can wash ashore large numbers of all sorts of small marine creatures (such occurred locally back in March this year). Since then it has been suggested that the porpoise and other marine animals at Worthing may have been the result of a trawl. The remains of the porpoise was picked up by the Natural History Museum in London and I hope to receive an official report on the cause of death.

While porpoise are not common in the eastern channel in winter they are occasionally observed, for example a pair of harbour porpoise were reporetd at Hastings (East Sussex) in January 2007. Over the years we have had the occasional winter stranding of porpoise off Sussex, in one year a baby porpoise with the umbilicus still attached.

Common Seal

I have just recieved a report, via the Sussex Wildlife Trust, of a seal that was spotted in the River Ouse just above Lewes. The seal was seen on Wednesday the 19th November at about 4.00pm. I spoke to the lady who made the observation and it appears likely that the seal is a common seal and quite possibly the seal reported earlier on Peacehaven beach.

More on the Peacehaven Seal

Further information about the seal spotted off Peacehaven East Sussex by Bill Carter. Bill also took the great pics as well.

Bills first sighting of the seal was at 2pm as he was cycling along the Peacehaven undercliff promenade on 31st October. It was a warm sunny afternoon with calm sea and the seal was basking on the groin as you can see below.



It seemed to be in good health and condition, with no sign of injury or distress. Bill took several pictures with a long lens from the promenade, the seal simply turned to keep a wary eye on him, making no attempt to go into the water. (see below)

Seals have an oily tear that runs across their eye to protect it against the salt water. This makes them look like they are crying, when they are dry and hauled out on the beach

Flipper waving, a friendly warning not to come any closer.


Looking at this photograph I am almost certain that the seal is female. Bill managed to measure a section of the groin shown in the photograph and we were able to estimate that the seal was about 1.2 metres. Female common seals are 1.2 to 1.7 metres and males 1.4 to 1.9 m, so it is probably an adult or young adult female.

The following morning was overcast and drizzly and Bill checked for the seal from the cliff top at about 11am on Nov 1st. To his surprise it was still there. The seal seemed more cautious today and slipped into the sea which was right up to the groin as it was high tide. It popped up a few yards offshore then dived again and appeared a hundred yards or so offshore, where it stayed for the quarter of an hour or so that Bill was there. It did occasionally dive for some lengths of time so it may have been feeding.

When Bill went back the following day it had gone and he hasn’t seen it since. In Bill's own words, a fascinating first encounter with a sea mammal in the wild.

Check out earlier blog entries for more Sussex seal sightings.

If you would like to see more spectacular pictures of the coast, visit Bill Carters website at
http://www.carterphotographics.myzen.co.uk/