| Nahant | 18 | Winthrop | 11 |
| Boston | 2 | Squantum | 15 |
| Hull | 31 |
Maury, Lauren Miller and I, on Deer Island at the end of the day, saw over 20 east of Deer Island, most of them in the area of Great Brewster Spit. There are many ledges there, quite visible at low tide. Harbor Seals frequent the area at higher tides to fish among the rocks, and haul out when the tide drops.
Undoubtedly, the Hull and Squantum groups saw many of the same seals. Perhaps there were double counts. Still, there were a lot of seals visible.
Dave Lange wrote about the Squantum route:
Two mammal events of note. The first was a young Harbor Seal resting on the lower part of Squaw Rock in very close–and we were without cameras. The second was at the low part of Long Island out near the tip. There have been 4 or 5 large construction size dumpsters sitting there this winter. While walking back, we heard noise coming from one of them. We peered over the top to see four Raccoons in a nearly empty dumpster. Thinking that they got in there and had no way out due to vertical sides, we opened the end a bit but they did not rush out. We'll check the dumpster in March.
Q: What's brown, furry, 3 feet long and eats cats for lunch?
A: Fisher (Martes pennanti).
Some people call it a fisher cat, but it is not a cat. It is a big weasel! Lauren spotted it walking toward us at the tip of Deer Island; she said very softly, "What's that?"
It took Maury and I a little while before we realized she was looking behind us, not out to the ocean. We started watching it when it was 30 - 40 feet from us, and it kept walking toward us, finally veering off about 20 feet away.
Maury kept wondering how it got there. I just wondered what it was. Finally Maury said he thought it had to be a Fisher, because nothing else is that big. He said he had spent many days hiking inland hoping for a glimpse of one of these.
Soheil Zendeh
last updated: 3/10/2001
url: http://www.gis.net/~szendeh/tmammals-2-01.htm