Wildlife spectacular: thousands of seals on Lincolnshire beach

More than 2000 seals come to Donna Nook beach in Lincolnshire at this time of year in order to give birth, and to mate for next year
The beach is wild and lonely.

The seal colony is well established here  - and visiting is free

The area is fenced off, but the seals come right up to the fence

Lying in the late afternoon shadows

Basically, seals just lie there: they don't do much!

The babies are white: they develop their colours over the next couple of weeks

At the peak, there are almost 3000 seals on the beach, but some have gone back out to sea.

As far as the eye could see, there were groups of seals

 

It was very frosty, but the seals have thick coats and don't feel the cold  

This one was trying to get its mother to feed it: they only feed for about three weeks, then the young ones are on their own, and need to go out to sea to catch the fish they eat.

Some visitors trying to get the seals to wave!

 Fascinated by a scrap of paper

The temperature was near freezing all day

This was an absolutely fascinating day: four hours drive from our house, but I would go again like a shot

Details: Donna Nook is on the Lincolnshire coast near Grimsby. There is a free car park, with a burger van, but there is also an overflow carpark which costs £2 and this has some portable toilets and very good access to the coast - I'd recommend that one really.
Viewing of the seals is free, and there are representatives from the Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust on hand to give information. There are also boards which explain aspects of seals and their behaviour. The seal colony is only there in November/December - the rest of the time, the seals are out at sea. But they return annually to Donna Nook to give birth, and mate for the following year. The whole experience is absolutely fascinating - a wildlife safari in Britain.