Walking along the rocky coastline of Kaikōura, a small coastal town on the South Island of Aotearoa New Zealand, late one Autumn morning – a place where the mountains meet the Southern Ocean – I find myself captivated by a rare sight.

Only a short distance from the rugged coastline is a deep underwater canyon, filled with nutrients that sustain this unique eco system. Acrobatic dusky dolphins can often be seen leaping into the air, hundreds of them moving as one while Hectors’ dolphins swim in the shallow murky waters. As glorious a vision they cut, on this occasion it is not they that become the focus of my imagination.

Albatross and giant petrels are soaring above the waves in search of a feed for the day, while scattered along the coastline are a great number of Kekeno/New Zealand fur seals that call this place home. Many of them are mothers with this season’s pups while the odd large bull is sprawled out on the rocks, basking in the sun. It’s the time of year for many pups to be out and about. They’ve been feeding off their mothers for the last couple of months and are gradually growing larger and stronger as each day goes by. 

In little rocky pools by the water’s edge the young pups gather in numbers, playing in the shallow and protected waters. Playful fights break out between the energetic pups. As they grow, they will start to venture further away from the colony in search of their own food and eventually venture into the deeper waters.

Among them is the vision that stopped me in my tracks.

Most fur seals have a dark brown coat of fur that was – at one time in the 1800s – a much sought-after treasure for both meat and pelt. During this time, severe over-hunting had driven New Zealand fur seals to the very edge of extinction.

Before the arrival of humans, it is believed that there were around 2 million fur seals, a number that dropped drastically once the Europeans arrived and started hunting the seals for pelt. Since finally gaining real protection in 1978, the fur seal population has rocketed to recovery. Today they are fully protected under the Marine Mammals Protection Act 1978 which bids it an offence to harass, disturb, injure or kill marine mammals.”

A part of me believes that without such protections, I wouldn’t be stood before such an enigmatic creature as I am today.

These seals may appear clumsy on land as they waddle along the rocky coastline. But in the water they are anything but. With their flexible flippers and strong muscles, they move with ease and agility in the water. While swimming in the deep waters of the Kaikōura canyon, two fur seals are curiously approaching after playfully swimming around one another blowing bubbles. I swim down and one seal instantly becomes excited and dives down to greet me.

They are proficient hunters which they undertake mostly at night, when their prey becomes active. While this might usually be the case, they certainly know how to find food during the day as well. And right on the edge of where the canyon starts, the coastline appears to be a great place for seals to find a feed.

As a seal is returning to the surface after a prolonged dive, the commotion begins. Albatross, petrels, shearwaters, and gulls flock to where the seal has surfaced. These birds can smell a meal from miles away and this particular seal has returned with the mother of all meals… a large ray, hanging enticingly from its mouth. 

As seals cannot easily break their prey into smaller pieces, I watch it thrash the ray about on the surface of the water, its goal to transform its catch into more manageable pieces. As those morsels fly through the air, the birds take advantage and grab at any piece they can get a hold of. Their waiting patiently has paid off.

As fine a spectacle as this all creates, it pales into comparison when my focus once again returns to a young pup, unlike the others. Unlike anything I have seen before.

Rather than the typical dark brown coat that most seals have, this one appears to be golden. With its golden fur there is no mistaking that he is different from the other seals. 

A standard day for the life of a fur seal contains plenty of rest and sleep… and this young pup is doing just that. Around 20 metres away, a large adult seal is moving through the colony, bullish as he does. Woken by the commotion, the striking young pup moves out of the shadows and into the sun. Out in the open and he appears to be glowing a golden orange colour, standing in stark contrast to the rocks behind it. This is a ginger albino fur seal. A wonder to behold for a photographer like me. 

Under the sun, he waddles along rocky terrain to visit one of the shallow pools, playing with the other young pups as he goes. Playtime is an important time for the young pups, this is how they learn how to defend themselves and how to fight other seals. After a playful time in the pools, he ventures back on dry land. Finding a protected area amongst the rocks, it is time for an afternoon sleep.

Looking closer at the top of his head, it appears as though he might have had a haircut. This is actually the case. There is a chance that you might come across a young pup with a brand-new haircut during Autumn – fur seal pup season in New Zealand.

This is a part of an ongoing population study of the New Zealand fur seals by the Department of Conservation. Marking seals with a haircut is a non-permanent way of marking them to be able to get an estimation of the seal population in a specific area. By marking a set number of seals and returning to the same place and counting how many of these seals are present during a visual check, an estimation of the specific population can be made. 

After a couple of weeks, the fur will grow back on the seal’s head and they are back to their fluffy selves.

It’s believed that only one in 100,000 fur seals might be albino. With eyesight often weaker than non-albino animals, an individual like this has to fight for survival each day. Particularly those that stand out from the pack – leaving them more vulnerable to predation. How well this individual will fare throughout the rest of its life, we cannot yet tell. Will it be accepted by the others in the colony? As a young pup, he appears to be well fed by its mother and plays well with its fellow seal pups.

There are very few albino fur seals on record. One of the more recent records was in 2020 when an albino fur seal pup was discovered on the remote island of Tyuleny in the Sea of Okhotsk, Russia by Vladimir Burkanov. This female fur seal did not appear to be accepted by the rest of the seals in the colony and was eventually taken into captivity to a dolphinarium in Russia.

Only time will tell whether this young and unique seal will make it to adulthood and have offspring of his own. Male fur seals tend to have a harem of females and will often return to a similar area to where he was born. 

Will we see this male standing proud with a harem of females on his side? Unfortunately the mortality rate of fur seals are high and they do not all make it to adulthood, my hopes are that this young seal will be seen in the future and grow into a large and healthy male fur seal.