{"id":796099,"date":"2026-05-14T15:27:21","date_gmt":"2026-05-14T15:27:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/796099\/"},"modified":"2026-05-14T15:27:21","modified_gmt":"2026-05-14T15:27:21","slug":"calls-for-more-education-following-the-suspected-death-of-mornington-peninsulas-beloved-sammy-the-seal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/796099\/","title":{"rendered":"Calls for more education following the suspected death of Mornington Peninsula’s beloved ‘Sammy’ the seal"},"content":{"rendered":"

Marine experts have called for greater education on aquatic life, following the death of what’s believed to be a beloved Australian fur seal known to Mornington Peninsula locals as Sammy.<\/p>\n

On Wednesday, Zoos Victoria said the Marine Response Unit was called to a rescue on the peninsula, south-east of Melbourne, where they found a deceased seal<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Zoos Victoria said it could not confirm whether the seal was Sammy as it did not have any original DNA samples for testing, but locals believe it was.<\/p>\n

How the animal died is not yet known, but Zoos Victoria said tests were conducted that could reveal a cause in the next few weeks.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sammy the seal rose to fame after Mornington Peninsula influencer Bec Watson created a Facebook page for the animal, posing as Sammy himself, stacking up over eight thousand followers.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Bec<\/p>\n

Bec Watson is an online influencer based on the Mornington Peninsula, known for ‘Bec’s Unhinged Reviews.’\u00a0 (Supplied: Bec Watson)<\/p>\n

“I gave him his little personality and I was almost narrating for him what he would feel \u2014 because I feel like he would be a sassy little seal,” she said.<\/p>\n

“He was just so cheeky, he’d get into so many troubling spots where you’d just look and go, ‘okay it’s his house now, we’ve just got to leave him, he owns that space’.”<\/p>\n

Sammy’s fame was elevated further when a seal caused amusement on Point Nepean Road in Dromana by sunbathing on the road, delighting motorists despite causing delays.<\/a><\/p>\n

Loading…<\/p>\n

After Sammy’s suspected death, Ms Watson said she was accused of contributing to the pinniped’s death by encouraging members of the public to approach the animal, cause it distress.<\/p>\n

“I turned into a little bit of someone to blame.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The influencer defended her posts promoting Sammy, which included showing the seal’s locations around the bay, saying she did not upload photos straight away and always maintained a safe distance when capturing photos of the seal \u2014 and encouraged others to do the same.<\/p>\n

“I was almost doing it for other people to be able to see him online and not feel the need to go and visit him,” she said.<\/p>\n

The Instagram selfies putting people at risk<\/p>\n

Jeff Weir is the Executive Director at the Dolphin Research Institute, a non-for-profit marine conservation organisation based in Hastings on the Mornington Peninsula’s east coast.<\/p>\n

\"Jeff<\/p>\n

Jeff Weir has researched marine life on the Mornington Peninsula for over 30 years.\u00a0 (Supplied: Jeff Weir)<\/p>\n

He said while a majority of the public respect the behaviour of seals, some put the animal and themselves at risk.<\/p>\n

“I’ve seen situations where, not so much the fur seals, but with an elephant seal and even a really sick leopard seal, [people put] their child on its back to take a photograph,” he said.<\/p>\n

“This sort of era of selfies, either being really close for yourself or doing something silly like putting your child on the back, is a very risky thing.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Mr Weir said there were more people injured in Port Phillip Bay by seals than sharks.<\/p>\n

“They’re wild animals and they can be very aggressive and they can respond and people can get hurt.”<\/p>\n

Loading…Seal population bouncing back after a dark past<\/p>\n

Marine biologist at Deakin University, Saia Bartes, said the population of Australian fur seals was still recovering from the 1800s, when they were hunted to near-extinction, primarily for their pelts which were used for clothing, including hats and coats.<\/p>\n

She said after spending several days foraging for fish, the marine mammal rests on land.<\/p>\n

“They are recovering all the energy that they lost while travelling to eat,” she said.<\/p>\n

\"Said<\/p>\n

Saia Bartes spend several weeks researching Australian fur seals on islands in Bass Strait (Supplied: Saia Bartes)<\/p>\n

While female seals often lay on the shore to lactate their pups, Ms Bartes said it was much more common to see males make their way inland.<\/p>\n

“But I’ve never seen seals coming along the road, that was something new.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Ms Bartes said there were several risks humans pose if they approached resting seals on land.<\/p>\n

“If we are bothering the animal and not allowing them to sleep and rest and recover that energy, that would be detrimental to other activities,” she said.<\/p>\n

“It could also be that they are injured or they are sick.”<\/p>\n

A risk of disease transfer also existed between seals and humans, but also pathogens carried on pets like dogs, Ms Bartes explained.<\/p>\n

“Even though they are really cute and really attractive \u2026 the best advice I can give to anyone would be to maintain a distance.”<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Sammy the seal was often spotted by locals sleeping in several locations around Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula.\u00a0 (Facebook: Sammy the Seal)<\/p>\n

Can social media be a safe education tool?<\/p>\n

Reflecting after the seal’s death, Bec Watson admitted she had had second thoughts about creating the social media persona for Sammy.<\/p>\n

“In hindsight now, I know he was a wild animal and I probably shouldn’t have made that about him,” she said.<\/p>\n

“I wouldn’t do it again \u2026 I’m deeply sorry.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Ms Watson agreed that more needed to be done to educate the public on seal safety, but said Sammy’s Facebook page, despite its criticism, achieved that.<\/p>\n

“So many people are on their phones, so many people are reluctant to pick up a book and do their research, I really thought [the Facebook page] is how we could get to people.”<\/p>\n

She said social media could still be used as a powerful tool to raise awareness of seals in the region, but stressed it should be done without disturbing the coastal creatures.<\/p>\n

“We’ve got amazing phones with zooms, so we can be a very good distance away and just still get a pretty good photo.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Marine experts have called for greater education on aquatic life, following the death of what’s believed to be…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":796100,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2],"tags":[39388,4740,12883,30811,324822,324819,324820,191091,50,324821,324817,324818,43297],"class_list":["post-796099","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-animal-safety","tag-australia","tag-beach","tag-beach-safety","tag-bec-watson","tag-becs-unhinged-reviews","tag-jeff-weir","tag-mornington-peninsula","tag-news","tag-saia-bartes","tag-sammy","tag-sammy-the-seal","tag-seal"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116573639404055339","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/796099","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=796099"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/796099\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/796100"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=796099"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=796099"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=796099"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}