Brief biography of the seal
For the ice zone, three types are most characteristic: the Greenland seal, a sea hare and a ringleled seal. As for the ordinary seal, it is quite rare in the Northern Arctic Ocean in the area of the Arctic Ocean and is found within Russia usually outside the polar Arctic. The seals are well adapted to the water lifestyle and the transfer of low temperatures.
Their spindle -shaped body has streamlined contours without protrusions, since the head deprived of the ear shells is completely smooth, and the short neck between it and the body does not have a sharp interception. The limbs of seals with the membranes between the fingers turned into fins and serve for swimming. These animals spend most of the time in water, quickly move in it and cleverly dive.
Moreover, their front flippers act as oars, and the rear - as a steering wheel. During diving, the ear holes and nostrils are closely closed, preventing the water from entering the organs of hearing and smell, which are very well developed in seals.
In water, seals are able to make inaudible sounds of ultrasound, with which they find prey. These sounds as an echo are reflected from the surface of the body of fish and are captured by seals. Their vision, although weak, the eyes are adapted to distinguish between production under water with a low brightness of light. This is facilitated by the large magnitude of the eyeball with a strongly expanding pupil.
The vibrissa bunches located on the upper lip vibrissas serve as a touch organs. The wool of the seal, consisting of short, hard and rare hair, does not have a undercoat and cannot protect the body from cooling. This function is performed by a thick layer of subcutaneous fat, which also reduces the specific weight of the body and facilitates swimming. They feed on seals with various aquatic organisms: some eat mollusks and crustaceans, others prefer fish.
Being carnivorous animals, seals on the structure of the teeth are similar to predatory mammals. Outside of the water, the seals become clumsy: they can only crawl on the surface of land or ice with the help of the front fins, and the rear ones are dragging around without taking participation in movement. Despite the fact that the life of seals is closely connected with the aquatic environment, they did not completely lose contacts with land, as they are forced to leave water for relaxation and sleep, reproduction and molting.
To this end, they move ashore, but more often to the surface of the coastal soldering or drifting ice floes, forming temporary roostering on them. The use of text materials of this site is allowed under the Creative Commons by-NC-SA license to use on a non-profit basis indicating the link to the site “The animal world of Russia” according to climatic zones.