VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) – They were sent out into the world and now we know how they are doing.

Several rescued seal pups that were tagged with satellite tracking devices and released on the Sunshine Coast are doing well on their own.

Lindsaye Ackhurst with the Vancouver Aquarium says the pups were let go in mid-October, and they dispersed right away and they were able to forage for food.
    
This is good news because it shows how active the animals are post-release.
    
She says they would like to do it again, but it’s expensive and they need funding. “Fisheries and Oceans Canada did donate the tracking devices for a time,and also for a couple of the programs it takes to run, it  about $5,000 per seal.”

The tags didn’t hurt the animals and they fall off once they moult.

Ackhurst says the animals traveled long distances, one of them going over 1,300 kilometres, “it gives us an idea of where they go post-release. We spend so much time with while they are in care, we don’t have any other way of knowing how they do once they are released out in the in the wild.”

The data also shows the pups are no longer human-dependent.