Part I: Seals teeth and whales ears - Scott Polar Research Institute ...

Next day began as a glorious morning, with sparkling snow cover, sea and
bright blue sky. Not a cloud was to be seen. I took a pot of paint and skied along the
beach counting the seals. I had timed it well; no pups had yet been born to the south
east, but I paint-marked the bull near the stream with a “red-nose”; he was rather
pugnacious. One cow was in the snow near the water, shivering violently, probably
near to parturition; another lay on the beach, scratching her hind flippers together.
Several of the cows had an infection in the form of orange pustules, looking like a
fungus, on face and back. It was more noticeable when the cows were wet, but not
very apparent when they dried. They appeared to be of all age groups, perhaps more
young than old. (I hadn’t seen this before at Signy Island).
After lunch I sat in the sun for a while and then went round the areas to the east,
to count the seals. One cow had pupped in area 8 and I painted her with a red XO on
her rump (for convenience cow A); her pup was small and very quiet. All the seals
appeared very timid compared with those in the South Orkneys; due to the sealers
perhaps. I returned later and took the sledge over to fetch the generator. I painted
another cow (yellow-right-spot; cow B) and a bull (yellow-nose; bull B) in the harem by
the camp, and would continue paint marking new arrivals in order to get timed data
on them, and to follow their movements and changing behaviour. It clouded over
and the wind began to blow, so I returned to the tent, where I wrote up notes etc.
read a book and listened to a puerile detective play on the radio before climbing into
my sleeping bag.
21 September was a watery morning with threatening bank of cloud in the east,
when I left on a round of the beaches. One bull had now moved up to the top of the
slope, just east of the camp and bull B had moved about 300 yards south. In general
the bulls appeared to be waking up to their responsibilities. There had been plenty of
roaring during the night and evidence in the snow of their conflicts. Several bulls had
small harems now – the largest was of 16 cows in area 8 and the bull was collecting
more, and preventing others from leaving. Altogether there were 3 new pups. I
marked the cows with a red-O to serve as identification of date of birth. Two of them
were exceedingly timid and didn’t even stay to defend their pup, but the third was
quite vicious.
I had done the southern beaches and was heading for the point itself when I saw
“Stella”, but she appeared to be going in the wrong direction. Then Arthur appeared
as I approached the paint depot. He had landed from the dinghy just inside Moraine
Fjord. Charlie had been about to come to fix my generator, which was giving trouble,
but took one look at the surf and flatly refused. Arthur accompanied me round the
rest of the beaches and we got back for lunch at noon. There were 118 elephants here
- compared with 7 he had counted yesterday on Hestesletten. After lunch we
climbed the hill behind and I showed him the giant petrel nests. Then we walked
southwards, re-crossed the ridge by a col into Moraine Fjord and returned to camp in
driving snow. I wrote a letter, since this will be the last chance of catching “Harpon”
before she heads north, and we went over to the dinghy after a cup of coffee.
Visibility was very low, it was “blizzing”, and the breakers didn’t look too good, but
Arthur in the dinghy rode them well. There was no sign of “Stella” so he began to
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