00:00And California's Año Nuevo State Park opens its doors to visitors for sea
00:06elephants washing which comes to the state's coast during the mating season.
00:10Let's see more details in the following material.
00:15Each winter from mid-December through March thousands of northern elephant
00:21seals haul themselves up onto the sandy beaches on the San Mateo County coast to
00:25breed give birth and compete for mates so these are elephant seals and it's
00:34pupping season right now which will go from the middle of December through the
00:39end of March and we the males have the big proboscis they've got the big noses adult
00:48bulls the largest seals on the planet can reach 14 to 16 feet in length and weigh
00:54up to 2 tons making them a truly imposing site as they battle for dominance and
00:59control of harems of females.
01:01Male elephant seals have the highest level of testosterone of any mammal so they want to mate fight eat press repeat.
01:14The northern elephant seals presence here today is a conservation success story.
01:21So most elephant seals come back to the same beach where they were born they don't
01:30all but most of them do and we have about ten thousand
01:35elephant seals.
01:40In the 1800s these animals were hunted so aggressively for their oil rich blubber
01:46that entire populations collapsed leaving the species teetering on the edge of extinction.
01:51What had once been abundant in the world's oceans was reduced to a fraction of its former
01:56number.
01:57Three different times when we thought they were extinct and then the third time was there were
02:07about 30 to 60 on the island of Guadalupe Island off of Mexico and at that point the
02:16president of Mexico decided to protect them and he called in the militia and so you could
02:23not kill them anymore.
02:27Recognizing the crisis, the Mexican government extended legal protection to the species in
02:32the early 1920s, followed shortly by protection in the United States.
02:37Today, more than 250,000 northern elephant seals roam the Pacific and Inon Nuevo hosts one
02:44of the largest mainland breeding rookeries on the west coast.
02:48But there are about 250,000.
02:51There is a genetic bottleneck because they're all coming from that same 30 to 60, but so
02:57far they're doing really well and we haven't had any problems.
03:02Visitors come in droves each winter, booking docent-led guided walks along dunes and beaches
03:08to witness the spectacle males clashing on the shore, mothers nursing 75-pound pups that quickly
03:14swell on rich milk and the loud calls that fills the crisp seaside air.
03:21The work of researchers like Laura has been crucial to the revitalization of the species, and the
03:27protection of these marine creatures, considered an essential component of the ecosystems with
03:32which they are closely linked.
03:34Thanks to years of monitoring, active conservation, and scientific research, it is now possible to
03:40better understand their ecological role, and advance strategies that ensure their long-term survival.
03:46To our viewers, we'll see you next time.
03:59survival.
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