Our Marine Science elective has had a dramatic few weeks! Last week, Ron Provost and his students headed to the Elephant Seal Rookery at Año Nuevo State Park. 

After a two-mile hike, they arrived at the lookout and were informed by the ranger that a female seal was agitated and might soon give birth. Over the next 20 minutes, they witnessed the birth of a 70-pound elephant seal pup. Ron has traveled to Año Nuevo with students for at least the last 15 years and has never seen a birth other than off in the distance. Their docent-naturalist, who leads two tours a day, has never seen a birth this close. 

The adventure took on additional meaning because the mother was a marked seal with two GPS trackers affixed to her, which means the learning will continue in fascinating ways. While to scientists the 3-year-old female seal is known as G375 and her pup has been named GK637, our students decided this week that new names were in order, choosing “Griffithita” (in honor of Dr. Griffiths) for the mom, and “Neep” for the male pup.

On their way back to school last Tuesday, Ron contacted the Elephant Sea Lab of Dr. Roxanne Beltran at UC Santa Cruz; Dr. Beltran co-founded the “Building a better future in science” program that works to make science more equitable for marginalized students. Griffithita is the research subject of two of her graduate students. When Griffithita was “instrumented” last May, she weighed 525 lbs (including a 2-month old developing pup inside her that the crew did not know about). She is part of a study examining the foraging behavior of juvenile elephant seals; about 40 seals a year are marked from several thousand on the beach and this past season only 9 were instrumented as part of this study.

Our marine science class and the two UCSC graduate students, Salma Abdel-Raheem and Zea Premo, have been swapping videos and data. The graduate students used our information to properly time their removal of the radio tracker to download a host of other information on the seal’s yearlong behavior. Over the next few months they will recover and analyze data on both seal behavior and ocean health.

Our pup Neep now has a flipper tag (GK637) so our Marine Science classes can look for both mom and pup on future trips, and Ron and Dr. Beltran have planned to keep in touch about the development of both animals. We’ll be able to learn about the trials and tribulations that Neep will go through this next year to become part of a growing population, as well as learn about the 250 days at sea between May and January, when Griffithita was swimming constantly, as the graduate students analyze the data from the tracker to better understand seal behavior and ocean health. Their lab is working in partnership with elephant seals to learn more about the ocean environment, so one of her devices was measuring plankton concentration by looking at water and discovering more about the ocean environment that still contains so very many mysteries.

“One of the great serendipities of the timing is that we’re just getting into the major text in the class, which talks about the decline and recovery of harbor seals in Pacific Grove,” says Ron. “The story that the students read this week mirrors the history of the northern elephant seal along the California coast.” In short, the field study and fortuitous “pupping event” is making learning tangible for our students–the kind of experiential learning we value deeply. Ron recommends the course’s main text to all of us, The Death and Life of Monterey Bay, by Steve Palumbi (a former Stevenson parent), which chronicles the collapse and recovery of the Monterey Bay’s ecosystem, and he welcomes a conversation if you want to learn more; he might even connect you with our students to share about the biology of this species. In the meantime, you can enjoy a few photos of Griffithita and Neep, as well as a video of Neep’s birth, here (gallery password: gopirates). 

In terms of a quick look ahead to other exciting happenings, I hope you mark your calendars for the opening of our winter musical, The Descendents, next Friday (shows are February 9, 10, 14, and 15 at 7:00pm). While we’d love to see you in-house, live stream is available as well.

And I’m sharing below a photo of a group of our students with Bills quarterback Josh Allen yesterday. We’re in the midst of the Pebble Beach Pro-Am, and it’s such a treat for Stevenson students to get to interact with these amazing athletes as they compete at Spyglass.

Sincerely,

Aimée Bates
Head of Upper Division

Note: This content was originally written and published on February 2, 2024 for A Week in the Books– a weekly, School communication from each division head to current parents and guardians.