OCBP sergeant offers assist after seal stuck in 5th St. jetty
OCEAN CITY — With an assist from an Ocean City police officer, the Marine Mammal Stranding Center rescued a seal that fell into a crevasse on the Fifth Street jetty after fleeing from a murder of crows.
According to Michele Pagel, assistant director of the Stranding Center in Brigantine, certified stranding volunteer Dawn Weber was dispatched March 13 to take photos and assess a juvenile female grey seal at Fifth Street and the boardwalk.
The seal was napping about midway down the jetty and Weber, after seeing the seal was in overall good body condition and was alert and active, stayed on scene to “babysit” it and keep people from approaching.
Two hours later, however, a murder of crows landed and began mobbing the seal and pecking at her head. Pagel believes the crows were attracted to the seal after it defecated on the rocks.
“The seal was getting pecked on the head by the crows so she tried to retreat across the jetty when [Weber] said she just disappeared from view,” Pagel said.
Weber went up onto the jetty to investigate and discovered the seal had fallen into a gap in the jetty rocks.
“It was really narrow down there, 4 feet, so we immediately dispatched” two people, herself and stranding technician Emma Denney. They realized it was too deep for the seal to get out on her own and she would be in danger of drowning with the incoming tide.
The space where the seal had fallen was so tight “we couldn’t safely maneuver the seal,” to they called the Ocean City Police Department. Sgt. Douglas Swillo responded and they asked to borrow the kind of pole used to catch stray dogs.
“He was great,” Pagel noted about the sergeant. “The Ocean City Police Department was fantastic.”
With Swillo there and a towel placed over the seal’s head, Denney lay down on her stomach over the gap on the jetty and used the loop on the pole to raise the hind flippers high enough so she could grab onto the seal.
“Once she could get ahold of those flippers, we hoisted the seal up and into the net,” Pagel said.
There is a video of the rescue posted on the Marine Mammal Stranding Center Facebook page, but it doesn’t include the final lifting part because they had to put the camera down so four of them could get their hands on the seal and into the net.
Despite the attack by the crows and falling into the gap, the seal “was in great body condition with no injuries at all, so she was able to be relocated to the wild that same night,” Pagel said.
The Stranding Center used a non-toxic livestock marker to write “#17” on the seal’s head to help identify her if found on another beach in the next few weeks. The marker will fade over time.
The same night, the Stranding Center relocated five other seals.
As of Friday, March 22, which was International Seal Day, the Stranding Center was caring for 18 seals in its hospital.
Pagel said the amount of care depends on the seal, but it takes at least a month and a half if they need relocation. Other seals are just picked up and relocated if they’re healthy. One reason they do that is if a seal is in an area where there are too many unleashed dogs.
– By DAVID NAHAN/Sentinel staff