A family in New Zealand came home to find an unexpected visitor on their front doorstep. There, curled up on their door mat was a tiny fur seal having a nap.
“It’s not every day you come home to find a seal curled up on your front porch, but during ‘seal silly season’ you never know where these adventurous animals might pop up,” New Zealand’s Department of Conservation (DOC) wrote on their Facebook page.
They explained the pup really went on an adventure. “[The seal] had been on a bit of a mission, climbing up the seawall stairs, crossing a road, hiking up a footpath, a driveway, and finally another set of stairs, before reaching its nap spot.”
During the period between May and September “young seals (and males of all ages) leave their colonies, making it a prime time to see them out and about.”
The seals, called “kekeno” by New Zealanders, frequently pop up on land near coastal communities during this time.
“We call it seal silly season,” Marine Science Advisor Laura Boren said on an Instagram post for New Zealand’s Ministry for the Environment. “Despite it happening every winter, it’s always a surprise for people to come across seals in unexpected locations.”
Like people’s front porches. This location was a little more impractical than most so the family called a Kapiti-Wellington officer to relocate the young kekeno. The seal pup was taken further around the coast “to a safe place away from dogs and traffic.”
The DOC explained that the seals may look skinny and sick. They also can have weepy eyes and a cough but “this is normal.” Boren added, “People’s protective instincts come up when they see young pups alone, or seals doing normal seal things like regurgitating, sneezing, or crying.”
But both government organizations explain that this is normal behavior and ask people to keep a safe distance away. Said the DOC, “If you spot one on land, remember this golden rule: Seals need rest, not rescuing.”
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