Day 82: Puppy Love

California Sea Lion (Zalophus californianus) pups are everywhere right now. This little guy was causing quite a ruckus in his pile o'Sea Lion. He was jumping on every other pup he could find and wrestling them into submission. Pretty cute to watch I have to say. We had a recent uptick in Zalophus numbers, their numbers tripled in the last week to just under 10,000. Most of these are adults coming in from colonies. Usually when we have high numbers like this it is because they aren't breeding/ failed breeding elsewhere.

Day 55: Zaloafers

I saved the most numerous pinniped for last, the California Sea Lion (we call them by their genus name, Zalophus). This is a picture of the pile of sea lions that occurs daily at North Landing. It always amazes me that they are so tolerant of each other. They can sleep on, walk on, jump on, each other with very little distress. They do get barks of protest occasionally, but that never seems to faze them. We just saw our first Zalophus pups the other day. This time of year there can be several thousand adult Zalophus here, inevitably piled on top of each other around the island.