SEALS IN LOCH NESSGORDON R. WILLIAMSON*ABSTRACT

A Common or Harbour Seal Phoca vitulina L. lived in Loch Ness,
Scotland, for seven months from November 1984-June 1985. Photographsof the seal are presented. This is the first time a seal has been proven inLoch Ness. Fishermen's reports indicate that Loch Ness is visited by a seal
approximately once every two years.
INTRODUCTION
Loch Ness is one of Britain's largest and deepest freshwater lakes. It is long,narrow, deep and straight 38 km long, 1.7 km wide and 230 m deep, is 16 m
above sea level and is connected to the sea by the 12-km-long River Ness. Itlies in the valley of a former glacier. Many salmon Salmo salar L. migrate
through Loch Ness. The temperature of Loch Ness surface water ranges
4-12°C (Wedderburn, 1907). The ecology of Loch Ness is described byMaitland (1981).
Common or Harbour Seals Phoca vitulina L. have a well-known habit of
exploring up rivers and in northern Canada permanent populations ofCommon Seals live in freshwater lakes 300 km inland from the sea (Mansfield,1967; Hewer, 1974; King, 1983). About 100 seals, both Common Seals andGrey Seals Halichoerus grypus Fabricius, live in the sea near Inverness. Individual seals of both species can regularly be seen I km up the River Ness inthe middle of Inverness town, especially at high tides. There have been several
reports of a seal in Loch Ness (Anon, 1933; 1934; 1934) and beyond Loch
Ness in the River Oich (Harvie-Brown and Buckley, 1895, pl83), but thesereports were not supported by photographs and were not believed.
OBSERVATIONS AND DISCUSSION
Between November 16, 1984 and June 11, 1985, a seal was seen in Loch Nessby myself and other people. Photographs were taken (Figs I and 2). The seal
was identified as a Common or Harbour Seal Phoca vitulina by its head profile,with turned-up nose by its grey colour with black spots and by its estimatedlength of I .Sm. The other species of seal found around Scotland, the Grey
Seal, has a long straight nose, like an Alsatian dog.
* Heather Cottage, Kessock, Inverness, Scotland, U.K.
Sci. Rep. Whales Res. Inst.,
No. 39, 1988, 151-157

521WILLIAMSON.
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153

SEALS IN LOCH NESS

about 100 seals hereNt

16 Km from sea

25 Km from sea

40 Km from sea•

Places whereseat was seen

0Fig. 3. Loch Ness showing places where the seal was seen.

This suggests that the seal "knew" where it was, was not "lost", and that itdeliberately remained in Loch Ness. The seal appeared to be in vigorous good
health throughout its stay in Loch Ness. The seal was shot on June 11, 1985.
About 30 people reported about 60 separate sightings of the seal to me.
Of these 30 observers, twenty-eight were local. people who had close contact
with the surface of Loch Ness - either fishermen in salmon-trolling boats orpeople who lived beside Loch Ness. Of the hundreds of thousands of people,locals and visitors, who drove along the roads beside Loch Ness during the7-month period, only two (that I know of) - a pair of Australian tourists at
Sci. Rep. Whales Res. Inst.,

No. 39, 1988

154

WILLIAMSONd心、フP竺、こフ ~~Fig.4.Sealmakingsuccessiv
ejumps.asseenbyf
isher
manMrGe1T
yBr
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Fig.5
. A CommonSeal
jump
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ands.Phot
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on:inLochNe
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imesperminute(measuredby
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Sc.
iRep.WhalesRes.Inst.
,No.39,1988

SEALSIN LOCH NESS155LOYAL事−

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.
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Fig.6.Dist• ibu
tio
nofs
ealsinScou
ishlochs,probablyPhocav
itulinα1985October: Anadul
tanda4・month‑oldyoungCommonSeals
eentogetheratDochfourWeirandnearFoyers(identified
fromphotographst
ake
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Thistotalsabout8s
ealsi
n15years(1972‑86):anaverageofones
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nt
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Lo
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v
er
ytw
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nontwoocc
asions.
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rofs
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ualf
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ari
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at
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eenasealyet.
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ive
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ichs
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alwasnots
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re.S
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ocalmentoldmethatsev
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hotbysalmonfishermen.Onerai
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heRiverNesswasi
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tseemst
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alst
hatenterLochNessgets
hot,bu.
tafewr
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ea.
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almakings
uccessivejumps,espe
ciallyifseens
ilhouettedagainstt
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ikeamany‑humpeds
erp
entormonster(Figs4‑5). Perhapsa proportionofs
ig
ht
ing
softhe Loch Ness Monster"andother sea‑ser
pents maybes
ight
ing
sofjumpings
eals.A successiv
eてjumping
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山 t.
,No.3
9,1988

156

WILLIAMSON

seal looks more like a "sea-serpent" than a dolphin: a seal jumps equal-length
jumps in fast close-spaced rhythm; whereas a dolphin jumps regularly andthe jumps are spaced further apart.
The distribution of seals in the larger Scottish lochs is shown in Fig. 6and was discovered by interviewing fishermen and river bailiffs etc. In nearto-the-coast Loch Shiel, Hope and Maree, seals are seen as follows:
L. Shiel : one or two seals seen most years, may stay several months, once
five seals seen together.
L. Hope : one seal six weeks in loch June-July 1983, one definite Grey Seal
one month in loch August 1984.
L. Maree: one seal seen 1981, five seals seen Sept-Oct 1983.
In lochs which have hydroelectric dams blocking their outlet river, suchas Lochs Morar, Lochy and Awe, seals are not seen. In former times in Loch
Awe, however, when the outlet river flowed freely to the sea, seals were seen:"The seal comes up from the ocean, through a very rapid river, into Loch
Awe in quest for salmon, and retires to the sea at the approach of winter".
(Anon, 1793, p260). "For ten years, up to 1883, we saw one or more seals in
Loch Awe almost every year, most frequently in the Autumn, but also in Aprilin some years". (Harvie-Brown, 1891). In Loch Lomond, which is near the sea
and whose river is unobstructed, seals have not been reported (P.S. Maitland
pers. commn): perhaps the industrial pollution in the Firth of Clyde during
the past century is the cause.
The former occurrance of seals in Loch Awe is interesting for it provesthat seals can ascend rivers at least four times steeper than the R. Ness (slopeof R. Awe 5. lm/km, R. Ness l.3m/km). (Fig. 6).
In rivers on the east coast, the furthest upstream places and distances
above tidewater at which individual seals have been seen are:R. Spey
Aberlour 27 km
R. Deveron : Bridge of Marnoch 30 km
R. YthanFyvie 37 km (A young Common Seal was photographed Nov.
30, 1984).
R. DonGrandholme Works 2 km (Industrial pollution and weirs inriver).
Park Inn Pool, Drumoak 19 km
R. DeeCaputh 24 km.
R. TayCONCLUSION

The data presented prove that a Common or Harbour Seal lived in Loch Nessduring seven months of 1984-85, indicate that Loch Ness is entered by a seal
about once every two years, and prove that a seal can live for many months
in Loch Ness. The route of entry of a seal must be from the sea up the River
Ness. These data suggest that past reports of seals in Loch Ness were true andthat seals have probably been visiting Loch Ness for thousands of years.
Sci. Rep. Whales Res. Inst.,

No. 39, 1988

SEALS IN LOCH NESS

157

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I thank following persons, R. Niall Campbell, Peter S. Maitland, Paul
Thompson, Sidney G. Brown, Sheila Anderson, John Horwood, Mike Fedak,
Julian Hunter, Tony Harmsworth, Adrian Shine, Dick Raynor, Gerry Breau,
John Bailey, Tony Chapman, Willie Paterson, D.G. Smith, Samantha Paske,Sandy Steel, George Reid, Peter Grant, John Cathcart, Brian Allely, Andy
Brady, Alec Slaney, James Macdonell, Peter Wilkinson and Angus Kennedy.
REFERENCES
ANON., I 793. Statistical Account of Scotland. Edinburgh. 6.
ANON., 1933. Strange spectacle on Loch Ness. What was it? Inverness Courier newspaper, May 2.
ANON., 1934. Loch Ness Mystery: Seal said to be seen at Fort Augustus. Inverness Courier newspaper,Jan. 16.
ANON., 1934. A Grey Seal: London scientists and Monster's identity. Inverness Courier newspaper, Oct 5.
HARVIE-BROWN, J.A., 1891. The Common Seal in freshwater streams and lochs of Scotland. Scottish Naturalist, Jan 1891: 1-5.
HARVIE-BROWN, J.A. and T.E. Buckley, 1895. A fauna of the Moray Basin. Edinburgh, David Douglas.
HEWER, H.R., 1974. British Seals. London, Collins.
KING, J.E., 1983. Seals of the World. London, British Mus. Nat. Hist./Oxford Univ. Press, 2nd edition.
MAITLAND P.S. (ed), 1981. The ecology of Scotland's largest Lochs. Lomond, Awe, Ness, Morar and Sheil. TheHague, Junk. 283pp.
MANSFIELD, A. W., 1967. Distribution of the Harbour Seal Phoca vitulina Linnaeus in Canadian arctic waters.
]. Mamm., 48: 249-257.
WEDDERBURN, E. M., I 907. The temperature of the freshwater Lochs of Scotland, with special reference toLoch Ness. Trans. Roy. Soc. Edin., 45 (2): 407-489.

Sci. Rep. Whales Res. Inst.,
No. 39, 1988