The Courtship of Animals

by W. P. Pycraft

The “bulls” of the Eared Seal are much larger than the “cows”; they have otherwise no very conspicuous “Secondary Sexual Characters.”

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But within forty-eight hours of their landing the cows give birth to their “pups.” And it is for this purpose, and not for mating, that they come to land. Within a few days of the birth, however, the females are “in use” again. This is the critical period in the life in the rookery. For the bulls now become frenzied with excitement and fight most viciously one with another, each hoping to possess himself of his opponent’s harem. Each tries to seize the other by the fore flipper, and, failing in this, the fangs are buried in the back. They hold tenaciously, each trying to force the other to relax his hold; but commonly this vice-like grip is maintained till the skin gives way, leaving great bleeding rents. Sometimes the contest rages till one or both is fatally wounded. Often during such duels an idle bull, hitherto unable to secure a harem, will rush in and capture that of one of the combatants!

In the management of the harem the bull is an adept. Whether he has five cows or fifty, he is, says Dr. Lucas, “master of the situation.” His will is law. Not that it is always tamely accepted as such, but the result is the same. If a cow becomes restless, and moves about, a warning growl usually quiets her. If the movement is persisted in and an attempt to escape evident, the bull is up at once with a show of fierceness and in chase. He may simply strike her down with his open mouth. Often in doing so his sharp canines tear a gash in her skin. He may even seize her in his mouth and deliberately throw her, or carry her back into the harem. If the cow thinks she has a chance to get away she may try to outrun him. If she miscalculates the distance he seizes her, after a few swift bounds, by the skin of the back, or by the hind flipper, and tosses her, often torn and bleeding, into the family circle. As a rule, however, she avoids this seizure by turning and facing her lord and master, and biting him in the breast and throat. But all to no purpose. In spite of her violent protests he pushes her backwards before him into the fold.

Sometimes in her efforts to improve her position she runs up to, and is seized by, a rival bull. Her lord speedily asserts his ownership by getting a grip wherever he can on the would-be truant. Then begins a tug-of-war between the two bulls, during which the wretched victim of their rage may be torn in pieces. By the elimination in each generation of the more querulous and discontented, the peculiarly gentle and passive nature so characteristic of the females has been developed.

After the first ten days’ sojourn ashore the female is allowed to go to sea to feed, returning presently to suckle her young. The bull, on the other hand, can enjoy no such privilege. For three long months he must keep watch and ward fasting—at first, in order that he may retain his territory; later, that he may retain his harem. This fast, having regard to the loss of energy and blood which this strenuous period entails, is wonderful; for in the case of all other animals fasts are always associated with absolute rest and sleep. Not so with the Sea-lion; he arrives at the breeding-ground fat and well-liking, he leaves a starved and battered wreck.

The foregoing summary of the habits of these most interesting and much persecuted animals is taken from the exhaustive report of Dr. F. A. Lucas and Mr. Charles Townsend. These two distinguished naturalists accompanied the United States contingent of the Fur-seal International Commission despatched in 1896–97 to inquire into the threatened extermination of these animals. Major Barrett Hamilton accompanied the British contingent, and also made a report. And it is curious to note that on some points he is diametrically opposed, not only to the American naturalists, but to all other writers on this theme. He contends, for example, that “nothing could better illustrate the fact that it is the cows, and not the bulls, which have the real control of the harem-system.” He traced the rapid growth of two harems from four or five to as many as eighty cows. And he tells these were completely out of control and free to move about as they wished. “The bulls, in spite of all their bluster, had the flimsiest of nominal dominion, and the cows were always able to, and frequently did, leave the harems daily to dally with the cowless bulls on the outside. Yet ... as long as they chose to sit massed together on the ground which had been appropriated by the two stronger bulls, no weaker rivals could approach to within ten yards of them. The master of the harem had no control over its occupants, but he was absolute lord of the ground on which they sat.” This is certainly curious, but more so is the fact that these females were allowed to return by the “cowless bulls” outside the charmed circle. Later in the season he tells us he witnessed an even better illustration of this singular behaviour. At this time “the division of the cows into harems was a very unequal one, the smaller bull being only able to keep a very few cows, while the larger one claimed the greater part of the rookery. But the cows could pass over to the smaller bull’s ground as often as they liked; and he probably was father to a great many more of the pups born in 1898 than those of the half-dozen cows over whom he claimed control.” In regard to two other bulls in another cart of the island, there came a time when the inequality of the harems reached such a pitch, that the newly-arriving cows “had to lie in scattered groups outside the main mass, and thus permitted the weaker bulls to form new harems out of the reach of the two strong old bulls.” But perhaps the most singular feature of all was the indifference which one old bull displayed towards a little bachelor, permitting him to enjoy the most intimate relations with one of his cows without displaying the least sign of annoyance, as if he could scarcely regard one so young as a rival.

There is much evidence to show that the erotic side of the male-seal develops early. “I saw,” he says, “the little black pups acting to each other in a way that made it certain that their sexual feelings had already made themselves felt.” This one can well understand, for only animals of strong sexual tendencies could survive the strenuous life which the period of sexual activity entails.

The very different interpretation of the behaviour of these animals at this very important stage of their life-history must be due to the fact that different colonies were studied which were living, too, under somewhat different conditions. It seems clear, for example, that the landing of the females so graphically described by Dr. Lucas was a landing under exceptional circumstances, the master bulls having taken up positions at the only spot where access to the desired breeding quarters was to be found; while Major Barrett Hamilton was probably fortunate in seeing phases which were wanting in the “rookeries” examined by Dr. Lucas. And both these observers again differ in the accounts they give of the life of such “rookeries” with those by Mr. Elliot, who explored these teeming colonies some years earlier when the number of animals forgathered there was far larger and the fighting, apparently in consequence, was far more severe.