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January/February 2000 issue	In this issue Table of Contents Editor’s Notebook Inside Story Feature: Seal wars Curious by nature

The harp seal is one of the more abundant seal species, and one of the smaller seals (averaging about two metres in length and weighing up to 400 pounds). It is widely referred to as Phoca groenlandica, the Greenland seal, but some still call it Pagophilus groenlandicus, the Greenlandic ice-lover. Its common name comes from the harp-like black wishbone-shaped markings on the adult male’s back.

Life for gregarious harp seals revolves around the pack ice, where they moult and breed. Their spring migration can take them northward 2,500 kilometres to summer feeding waters; they return south ahead of the fall ice. There are three geographically distinct harp seal populations: the northwest Atlantic or Newfoundland group, the Gulf herd, which breeds on ice in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and the Jan Mayen or West Ice herd, which breeds on ice in the Greenland Sea, near Jan Mayen Island.

Each spring, vast ice floes teem with adult female harps, which give birth in February and March. After two or three weeks, pups lose their fluffy white fur and develop a "lanugo" coat consisting of four- to five-centimetre-long guard hairs and a soft undercoat of curly, woolly fur. Within three more weeks, they have shed that coat and are left with a short, creamy grey coat with black spots, which merge into larger black patches as they age. During their annual moult, which begins in early April and lasts about a month, seals shed not only their coats, but also large pieces of skin.

Females nurse only their own pups. Nursing often, the pups grow so fast they can triple their weight and double their girth in about two weeks. Pups don’t enter the water until they are about three or four weeks old, and even then have a hard time diving because they lack experince and are fat and buoyant. It is thought that adults can dive up to 150 fathoms and can remain underwater for 15 minutes.

Harp seals feed mainly on small marine fishes such as cod, capelin and herring, but will also look for crustaceans and large sea plankton. By breeding season in February, seals are quite fat but will undergo a period of fasting that leaves them lean by May, when it is again time to migrate.

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