Painting is one of my favorite things to do with the seals. Each painting is unique and we like to figure out what different paintings look like. Check out this example of one Chacoda did that resembles a man diving. This is a video of one of Lana's recent painting sessions. The paintbrush fits into a red holder that she bites on to. I ask her to "take" the brush holder and then "paint."

Here's the finished masterpiece:

-Justin

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So far it's working well. As of today, Chuck will allow me to continue to brush his top teeth with the rotary brush while brushing his bottom teeth with the new Sonicare brush! Chuck is actually getting pretty comfortable with the new Sonicare with toothpaste!

-Erin

The New England Aquarium is monitoring a marine mammal visitor today! A juvenile harp seal (Phoca groenlandica) has hauled out on one of the docks in Boston harbor and appears to be resting comfortably. It is normal to see these seals in our area at this time of year. The Aquarium's Marine Animal Rescue Team observed the seal this morning and found the animal to be "BAR." In clinical terms that means Bright, Alert and Responsive--a good thing if you're a harp seal. The seal is plump and has no obvious signs of injury.

It will be allowed to rest comfortable but will be checked from time to time by the Rescue staff to be sure. Harp seals are born on pack ice in the Maritime Provinces and are quite accustomed to the frigid temperatures. These seals will wander in their first couple of years of life and it is not unusual to see them here during the winter months. Harp seals in New England are mainly seen alone and not in groups. In fact the Rescue department has already had multiple calls about ice seals (which include harp and hooded seals) throughout the Massachusetts coast this year. Most of the time when these animals haul out they do so on pack ice or in snow in and around the various harbors and inlets. Seals are also semi-aquatic which means they do spend time out of the water and it is not unusual for them to spend up to 72 hours or more out of the water.

If you come across a harp seal hauled out, it's important for the safety of the seal and its admirers to maintain a minimum distance of 150 feet. Seals are a protected species so maintaining a safe distance isn't just about safety, it's also the law. Here's a slideshow of our new harp seal friend taken by Aquarium educators.



(The information in this post comes courtesy of Adam Kennedy and Connie Merigo from the New England Aquarium Marine Animal Rescue Team.)

The harbor seals have been comfortable getting their teeth brushed with a manual toothbrush for some time, so now we're introducing a rotary toothbrush. This battery-operated toothbrush has a smaller head that quickly rotates in circles. We share a couple of brush bases, but as you see in the picture, everyone has their own brush head. The letters on the heads tell us whose toothbrush it is. For example, "CA" stands for Cayenne.

Having a toothbrush that moves on it's own takes some getting used to. We took it slow, but as you can see from the picture above, 6 of the 7 seals are using the rotary toothbrush for some or all of their toothbrushing. Here is a video of Cayenne getting her teeth brushed with the rotary toothbrush - if you listen carefully you can even hear the sound of the toothbrush.

-Erin

-Lindsay

Not too long ago I told you about the first behavior I trained with Smoke. Now that Smoke's inverted bottle behavior is solid, I moved on to Lana, Smokey's partner in crime. For my first behavior with Lana I chose one where she goes to the exhibit's window on cue. We figured it would be a good one because it allows visitors to get a closer look at the seals.

Before training the new behavior I came up with a training plan. Training plans include what you want your finished behavior to look like and the steps, or approximations, that you will take to reach your goal. In Lana's case, I wanted her to go to the window in the exhibit and touch her nose to the glass while also putting her flippers on the window. And here's the hard part...She has to hold that position until I bridge (see Erin's previous blog about training terms), by saying the word "good".

In this video you can see the steps (approximations) I took to reach the finished behavior:



At first I had to get her going to the window on cue. Next I increased the amount of time she was holding at the window. After that I reinforced when her flippers touched the window while she was holding the position, until eventually she would automatically put her flippers on the glass right away. Next we worked on holding that position for up to 10 seconds. The last step was getting her to go to the window from a far distance. All in all it took 1 - 2 months to train this behavior. I wonder what I'll try to train next ...

-Justin

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Not only does it look like Trumpet and Cayenne are looking at their reflections, but this mother and daughter pair strike the same pose!

What you don't see in the video is that Lindsay is to my right. Reggae startled and sent a wave of tsunami-like proportions upon us and got Lindsay even worse than me. When I looked up Lindsay was dripping from head to toe ... soaked!

Getting wet is all part of the job for a marine mammal trainer (check out this previous post from warmer times), it's just a little less enjoyable when the temperature is in the teens and it's snowing out. At least we can laugh at ourselves.

-Justin

-Erin

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Check out the video of our Trainer for a Morning program featured on WHDH.

-Rochelle

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Rochelle and I were the only two trainers on last week. With seven seals to feed you might think it would be difficult, but this is where those name targets come in handy. Each of us did two sessions with five seals at a time, which allowed the other trainer to focus on two. It was enriching for both us and the seals; you will notice that Rochelle and I didn't always feed the same animals or even line them up in the same order, but by using those name targets we were able to keep the five seals together calmly and give everyone the attention they deserved.


Here is Rochelle with (starting from the top) Trumpet, Lana, Smoke, Reggae, and Amelia.
Can you find all five targets?


In this picture I am working with (from the top) Cayenne, Chuck, Smoke, Reggae, and Lana. With the other four seals focusing on their name targets I am able to give Smoke some of her daily eye drops.

I wonder what today will bring?

-Erin

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Of course, there's nothing like dancing to get everyone moving!

So what do you like to do to stay active? Be sure to check back to see what new activities we are trying out and how the new exhibit is coming along.