By Josh Rogers
It was a typical weekend in Battery Park City with many mammals visiting the neighborhood and enjoying the Hudson River, but instead of walking, two of them swam in and stayed in the water — delighting the two-legged creatures watching from the land.
Two seals splashed around in North Cove Marina for over an hour on Saturday, and perhaps they were the same ones who returned to the cherished spot Sunday.
More and more seals are being spotted in New York Harbor and a cleaner Hudson River, but the B.P.C. frolic was unusual for two reasons: the seals got so close to humans for such a long time in the Hudson River, and the seals were in all likelihood not the somewhat more common harbor seals, but appeared to be rarer harp seals.
“That’s a great sighting,” said Dave Taft, district ranger for the Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge. Taft was most impressed that it looked to be harps, but he acknowledged that seeing any seal so close near the Hudson was unusual. Different people knowledgeable about marine harbor life interviewed for this article split between what was most noteworthy about the event. Visitors to North Cove Saturday who were either there for a free model boat program or were just passing by, watched with wonder.
“The seals seemed really interested in being observed,” said Ted Wallace, a certified sailing captain who saw them Saturday and Sunday. “They would come up close and look at people and they would roll over and dive into the water.”
Wallace, a member of the Manhattan Sailing Club, was running the club’s new Laser boat race program in which visitors can power remote control model boats for free. He said he has been noticing seals more and more on the rocks near the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge while sailing, but he had not seen them in the marina before last weekend.
Taft said it is hard to tell if harp seals are happy, but it is easy to understand why many people think they are. “They look like they’re smiling — they look like a puppy,” he said.
He and others describe the seals as curious in the right situation.
“In their own element, they tend to be very curious and will approach vessels and surfers,” said Kim Durham, who directs the Riverhead Foundation’s marine rescue program. She said seal sightings are way up on the ocean shores and beaches of Long Island but long Hudson River looks are much less common. She encourages people who see seals to call the foundation’s hotline, 631-369-9829, so that her group can collect more information about seal activity and have a history if a particular seal is hurt.
Above, this seal is undoubtedly a more rare harp seal, according to a marine rescuer with the Riverhead Foundation. The other seal who swam in the icier part of the water is also likely to be a harp.
WWW Downtown Express
