Elephant Seals

If you have never seen a 5,000-pound animal bathing on the beach, now is your chance. There are only a few places in the world where elephant seals live and even fewer places where elephant seals are accessible to the public.

Piedras Blancas Elephant Seal Rookery is a spectacle that must be seen. Hundreds of elephant seals lined up on the beach, basking in the midday sun, are a wonder of nature that you won’t soon forget.

Approximately 5.5 miles north of San Simeon on the ocean side of Highway One, is Piedras Blancas Elephant Seal vista point. Visitors can park and learn all about these magnificent creatures through educational and interpretive signs, by viewing the animals at close quarters, and through volunteer guides who, after graduating from Elephant Seal School, are able to help visitors understand these magnificent marine mammals.
 

Elephant seals have some remarkable statistics, including:

              
Safety is important around elephant seals, so remember:

• View the elephant seals from a safe and respectful distance.

• Dogs and seals don’t mix. Keep dogs on a leash and far away from the elephant seals.

• Never get between an elephant seal and the water. Elephant seals are wild animals and are therefore unpredictable and potentially dangerous.

• Please stay off the sand dunes at Piedras Blancas, as sand dunes are fragile ecosystems.

• Federal law protects elephant seals. It is illegal to harass any marine animal.
  

   

  Elephant Seal Calendar:

   

  January	Females are arriving and giving birth. Elephant seal births peak during the last half of January.
  February	Births continue, and mating peaks around Valentine’s Day. Females leave the area.
  March	The last adults leave, and weaned pups can be seen teaching themselves to swim.
  April	Females and juveniles return to the beach to molt.
  May	Females and juveniles are around.
  June	Sub-adult males return to molt.
  July	Sub-adult and adult males can be seen.
  August	Last of the males are molting.
  September	Young-of-the-year and juveniles can be seen on the beach.
  October	Young-of-the-year and juveniles can be seen on the beach.
  November	Sub-adult males can be seen on the beach. Toward the end of the month mature males begin arriving.
  December	Bulls continue to return. Females begin to arrive, and the first birth is usually around the middle of the month.

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