Nicole Teutschel at UC Santa Cruz Long Marine Lab, CA -- We finally recovered Cheddar's tags...in Piedras Blancas. She's one odd seal. She spent a couple of weeks swimming within a few miles off Año Nuevo State Reserve and taunted us as we searched the beaches looking for her. Typically seals who are within 40 kilometers (24 miles) of Año Nuevo hit land the next morning. But day after day, Cheddar stayed just off shore. She never hit land!

Nicole Teutschel at UC Santa Cruz Long Marine Lab, CA--Clara, the 13-year-old elephant seal tagged by TOPP last May, had her tags removed today. It was no ordinary day for the E-Seal team! Clara didn’t return to Año Nuevo, instead she chose to come ashore at Piedras Blancas to have her pup. Like Año Nuevo, Piedras is an elephant seal colony south of Big Sur, and is comprised of many little harems along a few miles of beach.

Nicole Teutschel at UC Santa Cruz Long Marine Lab, CA - And four more named seals are back! Since it was at least five days since Myoceen gave birth to her pup, we drove down to Piedras Blancas last Thursday to recover her satellite tag. We found Myoceen in a large harem just north of San Simeon and home to another elephant seal colony that's now larger than the one at Año Nuevo. Myoceen is 15 years old -- that's getting up there for female elephant seals. After over a week of fasting on shore, Myoceen still weighed more than 1,150 pounds! When we tracked her down on January 10, a couple of days after she arrived on the beach, we estimated that she weighed well over 1,300 pounds.

Nicole Marie Teutschel at UC Santa Cruz Long Marine Lab, CA -- Yesterday, at Piedras Blancas it was clear that last weekend’s storm had a dramatic effect on the colony. Many seals were pushed to the tops of sand dunes, up against the fence next to the highway, off the beach into cow pastures, and even across the highway!

Nicole Marie Teutschel, at UC Santa Cruz Long Marine Lab--Last spring TOPP researchers from the Costa Lab at UC Santa Cruz deployed satellite tags on 20 adult female elephant seals. The tag from one seal who arrived at Año Nuevo State Reserve early in November was recovered, while the remaining 19 seals are making their way back to shore.