Baltic Grey Seals at Hannover, 23/03/13

Halichoerus grypus balticus

Feeding time!

Halichoerus grypus macrorhynchus

Are the ones found in American zoos all H. g. grypus?

~Thylo

For the sake of consistency I've followed Zootierliste in the name, but there is something of a haze around the correct names for Grey Seal subspecies (and, indeed, whether there are two or three). I've not looked into it in enough depth to form an opinion of my own as yet!

Zootierliste uses macrorhynchus for Eastern Atlantic animals, but I'm not sure if this is 'correct' - these are the potential third subspecies and from what I have read so far, should either be included in grypus or split as atlanticus. May be a project for this weekend to have a look into!

Certainly Western Atlantic animals would be grypus, and although I don't know for sure, it would be surprising if Eastern Atlantic/Baltic animals had been taken to the US in any numbers.

@ThylacineAlive As this came back to my attention I thought I'd fight back again that these are actually Halichoerus grypus grypus, since the holotype for the species has been found to be a Baltic Grey Seal not an Atlantic one, and so the Baltic subspecies has to be the nominate! Atlantic animals are now H. g. atlanticus, and both balticus and macrorhynchus are no longer valid names.

@Maguari Right you are! How very confusing, isn't it

~Thylo