Grey seal mating

[Lemaildetom]

When i was last watching quietly grey seal pups (https://www.talkphotography.co.uk/threads/seal-youngster-from-orkney.641714/), we got interrupted by a lot of racket coming from the other side of the beach. It wasn't the best condition lightwise so picutre where mostly shot at iso 3600. And the action was pretty far so I they had to be cropped a fair bit. They've been hard to processed with some bright highlights but i have kept them more has a record that top draw technically perfect shot (kind of shot i don't really do ;-))!

Taken early December in South Ron. This cow was still with her young pup at the time. A really insistent bull arrived. He was humming for a while trying to get her attention and smelling her at a distance. She keep rejecting him and a pretty violent fight started. But the bull took over and after a while got what he wanted.

A few picture:

Some more in here if you want: https://goo.gl/photos/LUeHxWNhGtK35AP97

 

[davholla]

Very good, sadly we got to Norfolk too late to see any mating.

 

[Lemaildetom]

Very good, sadly we got to Norfolk too late to see any mating.

I was intending to see pups to be honest, never thought we would see some mating. This felt a bit like shooting seal porn!
To be fair it started has a big fight and i thought she was categorically refusing his offer.... And so she did for maybe half an hour.

Intriguing too is that there was another bull in the water only 50m away, he must have been a challenger bull. I've read that sometime when the dominant bull is "busy" or having a nap after having been "busy" it can open a window for challenger bull to try on to the female.