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This year another anti-record was set: for the first time, museologists had to care for a seal that weighed less than 10 kilograms.
“Firstly, seals weighing at least 40 kilograms are thrown into the sea,” said Arūnas Grušas, head of the Department of Marine Birds and Mammals.
This biologist has saved around one hundred and a half seals in more than 30 years, most of which have returned to their native Baltic Sea.
The animals will come out of the museum pools with their names. All the races this year, nine females and twelve males, are named after Samogitian. A. Grušas, who was running out of names, came up with an action, thanks to which he hopes to receive names for the seals from different regions of Lithuania every year. This year’s districts were given fun and memorable Samogitian names: Koisis, Zliose, Juoris, Klecks, Ruculis, Pottė, Tešlius, Žebelė, Ciongs, Drapana, Dziegorėlis, Gaida, Videlčius, Kresniukas, Kurdupelis, Balgalvė, Kiusvietka, Gikalelo.
A. Grušas was pleased that the name collection was a break after long, difficult and stressful treatment and rehabilitation of animals.
Photo by A. Mažūnas
“All the seals had a lot of problems,” remembers Arūnas. – In addition to the usual – exhaustion, diarrhea – it also contributed to the smallpox virus (similar to chickenpox), and the fact that due to lack of space they lived in crowds, so they easily spread to each other. In addition, they have different characters, not all of them fight for food, so the most angry repelled them and this did not manage to gain the necessary weight for freedom. “
While the Baltic Sea Animal Rehabilitation Center is under construction (to be completed in a year), the seals are treated in one of the two bathrooms in the administration building and then taken to the quarantine facility and swimming pool of the Museum. All the seals were treated with antibiotics.
Photo by A. Mažūnas
The remaining nine seals will be released in the Baltic when they can gain the required weight. A. Grušas hopes that when the number of districts decreases, it will be possible to create better conditions.
“There are intellectuals,” smiled the biologist, “who are not pushing for the fish, waiting on the corner for others to be satisfied.” And when they get the fish, they don’t swallow it, but gnaw, like some gourmets, a piece. This is how Klecks weighs only 21 kilograms, so he still needs to eat a lot of fish in the museum before seeing the Baltics. “
Twenty-one seals eat more than 60 kilograms of fish a day. And for the whole month, the museum has to buy almost a ton of fish just for the seals.
“The seals feed on small herring,” said A. Grušas. “They need at least three kilograms a day.”
Photo by A. Mažūnas
The Ministry of the Environment helps the Maritime Museum to care for the Baltic gray seals. Each year, it allocates funds for the treatment and care of Baltic gray seals. The Ministry of the Environment also allocated funds from the EU funds measure “Management and protection of water resources” to the Baltic Sea Animal Rehabilitation Center. The center is being built next to the museum, in the dunes, on the site of a decades-old reinforced concrete pool that was used for electric fishing experiments during the Soviet era.
The Baltic gray seal (Halichoerus grypus macrorhychus) is a rare and endangered species listed in the Red Books of Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Finland, Sweden, and Russia. These seals already live in the Baltic Sea for 10 thousand. years.
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