Lunch at Lorne...

[khiemtran]

Located on the famous Great Ocean Road, Lorne is a popular holiday town. Winter is off-season though, so it was fairly quiet when we went there last week. But at least one of the locals was out enjoying themselves in the water... Can you work out what it is?



It's an Australian fur seal. Or possibly a sea lion, but most likely a fur seal...



The usual way to tell the difference between a seal and a sea lion is that the latter have external ears and they can bend their hind flippers so they can walk on four "feet".



The rule breaks down in Australia though, as the "fur seals" are actually more closely related to sea lions than to "true seals". We watched this one eating its lunch not far beyond the surf. Difficult to tell if that's a fish or a crab it's shaking in its jaws. We did wonder afterwards if maybe the crab had grabbed its nose and it was trying to shake it off...

Comments

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

I hope for the seal's sake that the maybe-crab didn't do that, but the seal was eating it after all, so.... I guess turnabout's fair play, as we say. :P

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

I think the normal way they eat things too big to swallow is to hold them in their mouth and whack then around (since they can't hold things in their flippers very well). So, it's most likely it was just trying to break it up.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

I love the sight of it lying on its back, relaxing! And maybe it was shaking the crab to kill it, the way cats do?

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

Yes, I think the normal way they eat things they can't swallow in one go is to hold it in their teeth and whack it around until it breaks up. Although, as you say, it might also be to kill their prey.