A one-eyed common seal named Popeye has been released into the wild at a Northumberland beach after more than four months of treatment and rehabilitation. The seal, rescued by British Divers Marine Life Rescue (BDMLR) on Crimdon Beach in County Durham in July, was aged between seven and ten days old when found, weighing under nine kilograms and suffering from dehydration, mouth rot and a severe eye infection.
Popeye was transferred to Tynemouth Seal Hospital, where volunteers named him after the cartoon character as part of the facility's annual theme. Despite receiving medication, his eye ruptured, and on August 26 he was taken to the BDMLR's North East Seal Triage (NEST) unit at Robson and Prescott vets' Whorral Bank Hospital in Morpeth for a risky operation to remove the eye, which proved successful. He was initially due for release at the end of September, but developed a further infection in his eye socket and an abscess on his side.
Darren Martin, instructor and training manager at NEST, said treating Popeye was a huge challenge, as his ruptured eye had to be kept clean constantly to avoid infection. Over the four-month period, Popeye's weight increased to 39 kilograms—a healthy weight for his age. In the wild, common seals can grow to 150 kilograms and live up to 35 years, and having only one eye should not prove a significant disadvantage as they primarily hunt using their whiskers.
Popeye was transported from NEST to Newbiggin-by-the-Sea beach, where veterinary nurse Melanie Scott released him from his carrier on Friday afternoon. Scott, who anaesthetised Popeye for his operation—her first such procedure in 40 years of veterinary nursing—described the moment as emotional: "It made me feel very honoured. I felt very emotional, there was hardly a dry eye on this beach." After emerging, Popeye took a last look at his helpers before tentatively swimming into the November North Sea. It is not yet known where he will settle, though common seal colonies exist at St Mary's Island in Whitley Bay and on Teesside.
Debbie Harrison-Hardy, a BDMLR medic, said: "He can go wherever he likes, he can swim free as a wild animal. We don't hold onto any seals, we don't have captive seals. Our mission is to treat them and get them well enough to be wild." She added that Popeye had made a special impression, calling him "a bit of a legend in his own right, he's everybody's sweetheart." Members of the public with concerns about injured wild seals on North East beaches are advised to call BDMLR's rescue hotline on 01825 765546.
