Community Science

The Friends of the Elephant Seal has three primary community science initiatives:

• Flipper Tag and Short-Term Dye Mark Resighting Program: Community Science team members read and record flipper tag or short-term (hair) dye mark information to share with scientists. This helps to inform us about elephant seal migration and vital statistics. The team’s observations contribute to the data bases of scientists following northern elephant seals  from multiple rookery locations, as well as those following seals released from marine mammal rehabilitation centers.
  For example, two yearling seals re-sighted at Piedras Blancas had an interesting history of having migrated between Ano Nuevo (north of Santa Cruz) and the Piedras Blancas rookery, each in the first year of their lives! Read more here.
• VHF Radio Tag Survey team: Team members with special radio receivers are able to look for and identify signals from VHF frequencies to help researchers locate instrumented research seals. Northern elephant seals travel long distances and sometimes haul-out at great distances from the beaches at which researchers expect them to return. Knowing the exact location, the researchers are then able to retrieve their equipment and data for their studies.
• Colony Census team:  An annual Piedras. Blancas elephant seal colony census is conducted in collaboration with Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo researchers. The Community Science team performs ground surveys on many of the rookery beaches, while the Cal Poly team conducts UAS surveys.  These annual counts are important to document the health of the elephant seal colony, as well as to track expansion of seals to additional beachess. Identifying the presence of elephant seals on rookery beaches enables actions to educate visitors and prevent potential human interactions.