Perhaps you think that courtship and child care take up a great deal of time and energy in our lives. Well, today we’ll hear about a species for whom the process of reproduction virtually never stops. I’m Jim Metzner, and this is the Pulse of the Planet, presented by the American Museum of Natural History.
This month, Fur sea lions are gathering in mating colonies on the black sand beaches of the Galapagos islands in Ecuador, South America. Colonies consist of one male sea lion and a so-called ‘harem’ of females. Although this is the month for mating, these female sea lions are pregnant and nursing nearly all year, every year. If you listen carefully, you can hear a sea lion pup suckling milk from its mother.
ambience: Fur sea lion pup suckling its mother
Ivonne Torres is a Naturalist Guide on the Galapagos Islands.
“A female sea lion gets sexually mature when they’re three to four years of age. And they will be mated by the male in charge of the territory, which we call a harem. This female will take about a year to give birth. She does and as she does, within one week she’ll get pregnant again. And be pregnant for a whole year, while nursing that baby for that same year. Only when the new one is born, they wean the older one. They’re always nursing and always pregnant.”
Meanwhile, male sea lions will spend much of mating season competing for the opportunity to mate with the females. And in case you thought that necking was just for humans, it’s also the word used to describe the wrestling matches between male sea lions. Which ever male sea lion wins the necking contest gets to mate with the females and thus passing on his genes to future generations.
Additional funding for Pulse of the Planet has been provided by the National Science Foundation. I’m Jim Metzner.