Re-Occupy Drakes Beach!

Ocean-front property taken in land grab during government shutdown.

Trespassers or rightful owners reasserting their ancestral ownership?

Around 1,500 seals live on narrow Chimney Beach in Point Reyes National Seashore. Humans had claimed the much wider Drakes Beach, leaving the seals to live in crowded conditions that flood during high tides and suffer from dangerous rockslides. Humans had hired goons park rangers to scare seals away from the prime real estate unilaterally claimed by humans.

During the government shut-down, the beach was closed to humans and the goons were furloughed. Meanwhile, "high tides and storms battered the seals' normal habitat."  When faced with high tides and winter storms that washed away the already narrow beach and sent rocks tumbling from the cliffs above, the seals went looking for better real estate.

"So the seals showed up at the suddenly deserted Drakes Beach, and they brought friends and apparently family, too. Seals give birth during winter, and the unoccupied Drakes Beach appears to be an excellent place to raise pups."

Male Elephant seals are gigantic; they can reach 4.5 tons and measure 20 feet in length.  The females are diminutive in comparison but still much larger than other seal species.  They are quite aggressive when protecting their families.  TBH, they also have a strong odor.  In short, they don't make good neighbors.  Best to leave them alone.

photo courtesy of Wikipedia

You can view them from above in satellite view on Google Maps.

Don't buzz them with a drone camera, though.  That would be extremely rude.