Pickle on the Beach

Today, the Marine Mammal Center prepped Pickle for release, while a BBC film crew recorded the procedure of affixing several UK-made transmitters. True to form, she tried to wake up in the middle of getting her second transmitter glued on, but was restrained and further sedated. Pickle was an interesting sea lion for us volunteers to feed and treat. Initially suffering from short-term blindness due to domoic acid poisoning, the animal was quite defensive until the symptoms subsided. Since many sea lions suffer permanent brain damage from DA, I doubted Pickle's chance for recovery. I'm very happy to hear of its release today at Rodeo Beach in the Marin Headlands. Photo credit: Stan Jensen, Marine Mammal Center.