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02/01/08 - Disappearing Grey Seal Pups off Corkums Island - by Bill

We saw a grey seal swim atop an ice sheet near the shore of Corkums Island.  She was writhing and apparently about to give birth.  They normally give birth on the ice where the pups stay for a few weeks gathering strength before heading out to sea.  We had an appointment and couldn't stay to watch the birthing.  When we returned a few hours later there were no pups on the ice and there was no mother seal.  There was only a hole in the thin ice where we had last seen the mother. 

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I think that the seal was trying to come ashore but settled for the thin ice sheet because she couldn't climb the rocky shore.  I found the following information on the net about the problems facing seals today.

Insufficient ice on the Northumberland Strait between Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island is forcing more grey seals to go inland to give birth, say federal fisheries scientists.

More than 3,000 seals have come ashore at Pictou Island in the eastern strait, where only 18 people live year round.

Grey seals prefer to give birth on ice floes. This year, there's hardly any ice, so the seals have to deliver on the beach.

Another 3,000 seals are on Henry Island, off Cape Breton near Port Hood.

"It's very unusual," said Jerry Conway, a marine mammal adviser with the federal fisheries department. "We've never had reports of any numbers there, maybe 20 or 30 would be reported."

The seals can be on shore about five weeks before the mature pups leave to enter the ocean.