Known as ‘people of the sea’ and often described as sad-looking, due to their huge, doleful eyes, the gigantic–yet surprisingly agile–grey seal can hold its breath and slow its heartbeat to dive to depths of 200ft, reports David Profumo.
Grizzled, wide-eyed and deceptively benign-looking, grey seals can weigh half a ton and snack on porpoises. Sometimes known as ‘people of the sea’, they remain the most mythologised of all our marine creatures.
A denizen of remote and turbulent seascapes, the grey, or Atlantic, seal is larger and more formidable than the puppyish common, or harbour, seal (Phoca vitulina), which is that paler, spotted species generally gawped at by tourists as it basks on seaweedy shores. Also known as the bruns wine, selchie or powart, the grey’s latin name—Halichoerus grypus or ‘hook-nosed sea pig’—is somewhat unflattering, but in Gaelic culture, where it has long been revered, it is simply ron-Mor: the great seal.
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