Calling all animal lovers your Valentine´s Gift Guide is here??
Planning ahead for the perfect Valentine´s surprise? This guide helps you seal the deal for that special someone. From adorable seal-themed gifts to Sanctuary experiences, we´ve got you covered, one flipper at a time??
It´s that "Who even bought me this?" time of the year again!
Got some unwanted Christmas presentsyou´re not quite sure what to do with? Those extra scarves, gift sets, or jumpers that have you thinking, "Hmm, not really my style!"
Well, we´ve got the perfect home for them! The Cornish Seal Sanctuary is collecting goodies for our 2025 auction to help fund our new residents pools, and we´d be sealy grateful for any donations.
Just pop them in the post or drop them off on your next visit. We can´t wait to see what treasures you´ve got!
A HUGE thank you to everyone who took part in the "Stockings For Seals" appeal last month in December 2024, thanks to your generous donations, we managed to raise a FANTASTIC £2,087.50 to help purchase Christmas presents, food and medication for our resident seals and puffins at the Sanctuary!
Changes to this Website
As you may have noticed, we, the Media Volunteers Team, have been amending the colour of the website from green to blue. We have changed all the everyday pages that you view, e.g. residents, information, etc., but all news updates, press releases, rescues, up to and including December 2024 will remain as green. We have thousands of pages to amend, and this would take us months and months, so we have decided to change only certain pages. The volunteers´ website has been established since 1997, but many of the older pages are used for reference purposes only.
These rescued pups are in the outside nursery pools for their next stage of rehabilitation which means they are on the road to recovery and also have deeper pools to swim in.
They are doing really well and are learning how to compete for fish which are all vital skills seal pups will need when they are released back out into the wild.
Roach Bug, a 10 weeks old male grey seal pup, was rescued on 6th January 2025 from Portreath by members of the British Divers Marine Life Rescue (BDMLR) volunteer marine mammal medics. The pup was found malnourished and underweight for his age with a wound on his rear flipper. Click here to read more.
Flea who was rescued on 16th of December 2024 from the beach at Polurrian by members of the animal care team, she is doing really well in the hospital. It will not be too long before Flea is moved to the outside nursery pools to continue her rehabilitation. Click here to read more.
Luis Woodlouse, a 3-4 months old male grey seal pup, was rescued on 16th January 2025 from Sennen Cove by the BDMLR team. The pup was found extremely dehydrated and black diarrhoea, also has a large hairless (alopecia) patches behind his head as well as a few small wounds across his body. Click here to read more.
Pup update - 16th January 2025 : JP´s Coastal Adventures! - Since being released back in December, our adventurous seal pup, JP, has been on an incredible journey, travelling over 600km around the beautiful coast of Cornwall??
JP even took a detour to the Isles of Scilly, perhaps a little sightseeing? Check out the purple line on the map showing JP´s incredible route so far! Whether exploring new waters or making friends along the way?? JP is clearly loving life back in the wild.
We couldn´t be prouder of this little explorer. Keep swimming, JP!
Pup update - 28th January 2025 : Sanctuary´s seal pup waiting for flipper-saving operation
The Cornish Seal Sanctuary has launched an urgent fundraising appeal asking its supporters to help a little seal pup named "Leaf Cutter".
Leaf Cutter needs a lifesaving front flipper operation which will test the Sanctuary vet´s precision surgery skills. The operation is Leaf Cutter´s only chance of survival as she would sadly be unable to swim without a fully functioning front flipper.
Tamara Cooper said "We have everything crossed for little Leaf Cutter. She needs an intricate operation on her front flipper that will see our vets try to only remove the affected bone. It´s certainly not a routine operation and will put our brilliant vets through their paces. We are confident for a positive outcome and hope to see Leaf Cutter on the road to recovery very soon."Click here to read the full press release.
Pup Update - 31st January 2025 : Thank you to the wonderful supporters who kindly donated to Leaf Cutter´s operation and raised over £1,000. She had her operation yesterday at the vets which went well. This morning Leaf Cutter was nice and bright - fingers crossed for a speedy recovery.
We hope you enjoy the selection of photos taken in January 2025, click here or on the photo of your choice below to see a larger version.
This month the Animal Care Team celebrated Aayla´s and Marlin´s birthdays with "fishy ice cakes!"
Happy 8th Birthday to our beautiful Aayla!
Seal-ebrating another year of you being flippin´ fin-tastic!
Happy 23rd Birthday to our superstar Marlin!
Our birthday boy was treated to a special fishy ice cake on the 29th of January, though celebrations took an unexpected turn when his cheeky poolmate Yulelogs decided the cake looked too good to share!
5 mins with...Muralist and Ocean advocate, Jasmine Hortop
Blog Date : 22nd January 2025
"Hi Jasmine, talk us through the mural for the Cornish Seal Sanctuary? How did the project come together?"
"As an Illustrator who works mainly within the conservation space, mainly with bigger NGOs, I am also really energised by local charity projects, and try to donate one project each year pro-bono. This year I had received a huge donation of emulsion paint which meant I had enough to create a decent sized mural for a local charity working within marine conservation. I live on the north coast near Godrevy, and am lucky enough to swim and surf with seals regularly and hence feel particularly connected to the conservation and education work that the Seal Sanctuary does. I came down for a site visit, met all the seals, and Jess showed me the space they had in mind. It was huge!"
Click here to read the full interview with Jasmine on the blog!
Click here to see the whole of the beautiful mural.
We went to check on a seal colony in Cornwall this month - enjoy admiring these photos. Click here to see a selection of photos.
These photos were taken with Nikon Coolpix P1000 camera which contains a 3000mm zoom lens!
Each released seal pup is given a flipper tag with an unique ID number. This helps the Cornish Seal Sanctuary and the Seal Research Trust to track and monitor where pups end up and how they are doing once they are back in the wild.
This month the following seals were spotted in the wild by Seal Research Trust volunteers from around the south west coasts of England and Wales:-
The information regarding tagged seals seen in the wild is copyright of the Seal Research Trust.
By monitoring the behaviour of seals after release back into the wild, the Cornish Seal Sanctuary and the Seal Research Trust can use this information to define the best practice standards and policies that they can share with the international rescue community.
Each seal´s fur pattern is unique and enables the Seal Research Trust volunteers to track them for life.
Seals face many challenges, yet we all depend on them to balance our marine ecosystem, which is essential to make the oxygen we breathe.
Seals are our globally rare wildlife tourist attraction, helping diversify coastal economic prosperity.
This news update has been put together by volunteers/supporters of the Cornish Seal Sanctuary.
