I hate it when people complain about things before thinking, sepecially when they don’t know much about teh subject matter.

Sorry, but knowing that seals = cute and ice = cold doesn’t make you an expert.
-Dark-

is a Japanese delicacy, lol’d wit rice

Snow will indeed remain on the soft, standing-up fur of a baby harp seal because the seal is so well-insulated by blubber that not much body heat escapes and the snow remains unmelted.

Baby harps don’t move much, CAN’T move much, when they’re whitecoats. That’s why they’re such easy targets for fur-hunters. And since they don’t move much, if one gets snowed on it’s likely to remain that way for quite a while, unconcerned about it.

If the seal was dead, snow would indeed stick to eyes and nose – particularly the nose, because it has texture. It would also stick to the eyes if they were frozen, because the snow on the face has formed hollows around them, into which flakes would settle quite nicely.

Animals in snowy conditions occasionally get snow stuck to them. They’re used to it. They DON’T always immediately clear it off themselves. Heck, look at pictures of plains bison in the winter – they’re caked in the stuff. It’s not a big deal to them.

Snow caked on a harp seal pup does NOT, in and of itself, mean that it’s dead.

Gladys: Do you has kidlets? My mom told me that you can eat anything you want when u is breastfeedings and lose weight… she says if u don’t eat like 3500 cals a day u finks u is starvins to death.

I dunno how mummaseals do it. The milk is some absurd percentage milkfat… I think it’s like 50% or more fat… ’cause baby seals won’t survive if they aren’t that plump! They have to put on that much fat that quickly to survive the weather. The fact that this one is so rotund that it can’t even move very well means that it’s being *VERY* well-fed by a devoted mummaseal. She spends ALL her time eating (and competing with other mummaseals for foods) and then flopping back to behbeh seal and feeding it until it’s puffasphere. Once the behbeh seal’s adult coat comes in, then mummaseal is like… thank GOD I’m done… and leaves the behbeh, who lies around for 2-3 days whining about it… and then finally schlepps into the water to katch its own fishiez.

A little snow in its fur is not going to kill it. It’s built for cold weather.

I goze now and klikz da googul adz: “Perfluroelastomer Seals”

Seal not dead. Eyes are clear, nose is uncovered.

If the seal were DEAD, then the eyes and nose wouldn’t be producing snow-repellant heat, and would be covered as well.

The seal has snow sticking to him … probably because he fell in the water and his mumma got him out in time. Plus, he has plenty of fur and blubber (oh, and SNOW!) insulating him (did it get mentioned that snow is a great insulator? Igloo? Anyone?)

Last time you got snow all over your coat when you slipped, I didn’t say you were dead.

He’s a happy seal, and mummaseal is clearly taking great care of him… she is probably off eating more fish because she’s gotta feed his little whininess! She loses SEVEN POUNDS A DAY just breast-feeding this lump-of-cute.

Go read National Geographic sometime when they do a bit on harp seals. Or look up a back issue – it was maybe 10 months ago or so.

–E

Any way you could throw this one out? Totally not funny. You would never post a dead cat or kitten, I would hope.

erin: dun wry, bebeh seal = not dead! just rofln’ so much he ar becomd sealball… gettin wedy fuh teh first Baby-Seal Bobsled team! just liek in kool runnins, but wif babeh seal dis tiem! WOO!