[Leica] There Be Beasties...

[henningw at archiphoto.com (Henning Wulff)]

Great stuff, Jayanand! I also find elephant seals fascinating. 'Prayers' is 
also my favourite.

Henning



On 2014-02-07, at 5:19 AM, Jayanand Govindaraj <jayanand at gmail.com> wrote:

> Elephant Seals look like prehistoric beasts, something out of a fantasy
> novel, or an RPG computer game, weird and sort of out of this world. In
> Gold Harbour, there were hundreds of juvenile males, most of them lying in
> groups, moulting their skin, piled close to each other, in a pungent
> mixture of mud, water and their excreta. Their mating season gets over in
> November, so the 5 tonne fully grown adult males were all out to sea,
> feeding and replenishing their reserves. They are quite amazing beasts, and
> radio tracking has now confirmed that they dive to 5000+ feet in the ocean,
> resurface for half a minute and dive again to the same depth. Nobody has as
> yet cottoned on to the body chemistry that allows them to do that, and
> research is still active around this.
> 
> Here a King Penguin inspects one such group:
> 
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/antarctica/Antarctica_20140113_3476.jpg.html
> 
> Usually, their inactivity is marred only by a leisurely scratch on a
> particularly itchy bit of moulting skin:
> 
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/antarctica/Antarctica_20140113_3568.jpg.html
> 
> They let you get quite close to them, just looking curiously back at you
> with those limpid eyes:
> 
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/antarctica/Antarctica_20140113_3648.jpg.html
> 
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/antarctica/Antarctica_20140113_3781.jpg.html
> 
> Some pray on the waters edge (-:
> 
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/antarctica/Antarctica_20140113_3714.jpg.html
> 
> But these are juveniles, and the testosterone flow is strong, and
> periodically they test their strength with each other, in training to
> become Beachmasters when they grow up, as well as decide the pecking order
> within a group. They joust on land:
> 
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/antarctica/Antarctica_20140113_3455.jpg.html
> 
> At waters edge:
> 
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/antarctica/Antarctica_20140113_3532.jpg.html
> 
> They come in all shapes, sizes and colours:
> 
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/antarctica/Antarctica_20140113_3872.jpg.html
> 
> The standard move is to rear back, mouths agape:
> 
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/antarctica/Antarctica_20140113_3890.jpg.html
> 
> Then lunge and thud into each other:
> 
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/antarctica/Antarctica_20140113_3921.jpg.html
> 
> Frequently ending in a boxer's clinch:
> 
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/antarctica/Antarctica_20140113_3850.jpg.html
> 
> They are so preoccupied, you can get in close, on foot, reasonably safely:
> 
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/antarctica/Antarctica_20140113_3962.jpg.html
> 
> Closer:
> 
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/antarctica/Antarctica_20140113_4016.jpg.html
> 
> And closer still:
> 
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/jayanand/antarctica/Antarctica_20140113_3937.jpg.html
> 
> They are surprisingly fast on land, and one has to keep an eye out for
> accidentally being trampled over, which with that weight and bulk.....(-:
> 
> Please see LARGE
> 
> Comments and criticism, as ever, welcome
> 
> Cheers
> Jayanand
> 
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Henning Wulff
henningw at archiphoto.com