{"id":222994,"date":"2025-09-13T07:31:09","date_gmt":"2025-09-13T07:31:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/222994\/"},"modified":"2025-09-13T07:31:09","modified_gmt":"2025-09-13T07:31:09","slug":"hawaiian-monk-seal-seen-molting-on-oahu-shore","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/222994\/","title":{"rendered":"Hawaiian monk seal seen molting on Oahu shore"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"text | text-start article-text\">HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) &#8211; A Hawaiian monk seal was spotted molting in the sunshine at Paradise Cove in Ko Olina on Friday. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | text-start article-text\">This seal, known as RL12, or Aukai, was born in 2012 and has given birth to four pups, according to the Hawaii Marine Animal Response. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | text-start article-text\">Monk seals undergo a \u201ccatastrophic molt\u201d about once a year. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Molting is when seals shed the top layer of their skin and fur to reveal a new, silvery coat, a process that can take up to two weeks. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Molting requires a lot of energy and therefore a lot of rest.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Seals often stay on beaches during this time because they are more vulnerable when they are molting. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Remember to always give monk seals plenty of space, at least 50 feet for adults and at least 150 feet of space for pups and moms.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Seal sightings can be reported to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration\u2019s marine wildlife hotline at (888) 256-9840.<\/p>\n<p class=\"copyright |\">Copyright 2025 Hawaii News Now. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) &#8211; A Hawaiian monk seal was spotted molting in the sunshine at Paradise Cove in Ko&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":222995,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[12883,120967,60217,120970,120968,120969,120966,12461,47369,120971,159,43297,33075,67,132,68,837],"class_list":{"0":"post-222994","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-beach","9":"tag-hawaiian","10":"tag-hmar","11":"tag-ko-olina","12":"tag-molt","13":"tag-molting","14":"tag-monk","15":"tag-noaa","16":"tag-oahu","17":"tag-paradise-cove","18":"tag-science","19":"tag-seal","20":"tag-shore","21":"tag-united-states","22":"tag-unitedstates","23":"tag-us","24":"tag-wildlife"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115195824424665369","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222994","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=222994"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222994\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/222995"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=222994"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=222994"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=222994"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}