Get ON MEDITERRANEAN MONK SEALS

Are Hawaiian monk seal carnivores, herbivores, or omnivores? Hawaiian monk seals are carnivores. They survive on a diet of octopus, bony fish, crab, lobster, eel and squid.

Mediterranean monk seals are carnivores (piscivores).

It is believed that Mediterranean monk seals can dive up to depths of 100 m. They generally have no known predators, although a few reports describe predation by orca (killer whales) and sharks.

On land, Hawaiian Monk Seals haul-out and breed on substrates of sand, coral, or volcanic rock. Sandy beaches with shallow protected water near shore appear to be preferred for pupping. Mediterranean monk seals are one of the least social pinnipeds when they are on shore, but may be more social in the water.

Hawaiian monk seals are "generalist" feeders, which means they eat a wide variety of foods depending on what's available. They eat many types of common fishes, squids, octopuses, eels, and crustaceans (crabs, shrimps, and lobsters).

The average δ15N, 10,40 ± 1,33‰ places Mediterranean monk seals at the highest trophic level of an obligate fish or cephalopod predator.

As a career marine biologist I have been diving with monk seals many times and they sometimes get very aggressive towards humans even when they do not have babies with them. Monk seals get very large and have massive jaws with very sharp teeth and even the large sharks are afraid of them!

Mediterranean monk seals have often been described as opportunistic predators (Marchessaux & Duguy 1977, Jacobs & Panou 1988, Boutiba & Abdelghani 1997) because of their ability to easily exploit a wide variety of food resources, though mainly those that are in abundance and thus easy prey.