Do seals bite scuba divers?

[Wingy]

It seems like everything else young juvenile males are the problem children - sealions are fun to dive with, but they will grab your fins and pull you backwards or down, zoom up unexpectedly and give you a hahahaha look before disappearing rapidly then reappearing two seconds later beside you...,I love them but they're a PITA.

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

Last year I got "gang tackled" by several, who literally pushed me from a depth of about 8 feet back down to the bottom at about 55 feet

<-- That's how I got the selfie that you see here

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

... and they will gang-tackle you ... like they did to my dive buddy here ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

<-- That's how I got the selfie that you see here

I got this shot trying to push one away that was nibbling on my camera ... that's a bit too close ...

.. Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[tilikum]

Wow, impressive.

 

[BEVANJ]

Here in NZ, it is illegal to intentionally get in the water with seals, as it is with dolphins and whales. It's a different story if you get in the water and they come to you. The fines are horrendous.

I hope the operator is aware of this.

 

[Landau]

A harbour seal once nibbled on all our group's fins - except mine. Apparently he didn't like look of my bright green fins.

 

[WantSomeScuba?]

Here in NZ, it is illegal to intentionally get in the water with seals, as it is with dolphins and whales. It's a different story if you get in the water and they come to you. The fines are horrendous.

I hope the operator is aware of this.

Out of ideal curiosity, how (and how well) is this enforced? I'm not disagreeing with the law, I'm just curious if it's used more as a scare tactic for dive operators, or if the NZ coast guard is actually drilling people for this.

And yeah, I went diving last Thursday and had a sea lion come rocketing out of an overgrown crane box. Visibility was bad, so all I saw before it veered off a few feet from my face was this giant, shadowy torpedo that moved like a 350-pound lightening bolt. Good thing my suit has a p-valve....

 

[sea_otter]

Those are sea lions in the video, not seals.

More of a common name confusion, but "seal", specifically New Zealand fur seal, is correct here. Even though it's a member of the sea lion family, looks like a sea lion, swims like a sea lion, has ears, isn't an actual seal... ;-)

 

[BEVANJ]

Out of ideal curiosity, how (and how well) is this enforced? I'm not disagreeing with the law, I'm just curious if it's used more as a scare tactic for dive operators, or if the NZ coast guard is actually drilling people for this.

And yeah, I went diving last Thursday and had a sea lion come rocketing out of an overgrown crane box. Visibility was bad, so all I saw before it veered off a few feet from my face was this giant, shadowy torpedo that moved like a 350-pound lightening bolt. Good thing my suit has a p-valve....

It is loosely enforced, but mainly by having a fairly aware public. We have the Department of Conservation here, who can, will, and have fined people in the past. All it takes is someone to report, and video it.

Most of the public are fairly mindful.

It's the same with people fishing in marine reserves here.