Hey folks,
This is my first post. Been fishing Lynnhaven & Bay area all my life. I was speck & puppy drum fishing early morning by myself on a Sunday three weeks ago. Tied off to the pier ruins over near the old Fuentes estate. Caught a glimpse of what I thought was a loose black crab pot marker floating by and between casts took a closer look. About 30 feet from my stern was either a full grown seal or a pretty darn big sea lion. It looked right at me for about a minute, complete with long brownish whiskers and a face that looked like a giant black lab. I scrambled to find my camera phone, but by the time I had secured it, it was gone. There was a kayak fisherman about 50 yards down the bank from me and several minutes later I spotted the critter again about face to face with the guy in the kayak. I cut loose from the pier ruins and drifted down on the guy in the kayak. I asked him if he had seen anything unusual this morning. He replied that he had indeed, and we both were glad that at least someone else had seen what we had thought we had seen, and that neither of us needed to change our drinking habits. I drifted on by the kayak and spied the critter again hauled about halfway out in the middle of the marsh stands directly inland of the old Fuentes bulkhead. When it saw me, it got back in the water again and started checkin out nearly every crab pot in sight, and I watched it head on off across the skinny water towards the marsh islands between Lesner Bridge, and the place where I was fishing.
End of story, and I'm sticking to it! Has any body out there ever seen this guy before or since? Was it more likely a seal or a sea lion? And what in the hell was it doing in Lynnhaven? Several years ago I did see a juvenile molting on the rocks at the third island CBBT during rockfish season, called the stranding team, and they indicated that it was a sea lion pup, to leave it alone, and it would move on when it was ready.

No, you're not seeing things . There seems to be one around here every year. Kinda crazy, huh? What's next, great whites?!?!

Could it have been an otter?

actually once in awhile a great white will show up in our area.

No danger of it being an otter. I build bridges for a living and I've seen a generous plenty of them. This feller was at least six feet long, and a good couple hundred pounds, he'd a been the communist otter from hell!

No..the only place Otter goes swimming is in Fisherman's Wharf Turning Basin....I spotted one there last week......Bob

Otter

Nice pose!!

Well, that's one pelt the Otter can keep!! Harbor seals show up around here every now and then, and I've seen a couple. Not in Lynnhaven though. And 2 or three years ago some netters off of the resort strip snagged 2 great whites in the nets. They were small, about 10 feet if I remember correctly. And that monster in excess of 20 feet long showed up off of Hatteras. Saw the video tape of that one. Huge.

The guys at the seafood market caught a great white off cape henry 2 years ago. They had it on display and the feds got wind of it. They came and took the shark and pretty much put a gag order on them. i guess the powers that be don't want tourist knowing that there are great white sharks in the waters off of VB.

Bob..I had no idea that otters were such ugly creatures !! No wonder people hunt them for their Pelts. I have seen better heads on BOILS ! wow!!

Two years ago we had a very large great white swim right up to the transom while we were wreck fishing. We were on the Morgan (33 miles out) feeding croaker to amberjack.

He gave us a few good looks while swimming back and forth a few times and then went down. 12 feet was our estimation.

Was fishin the Lesner late night couple weeks ago and had an otter run off with a 23" flounder I buried on the beach.
Didn't look like the one pictured above though.

hahahaha...why whould you bury your flounder?

No stringer and fish was gut hooked bad otherwise I would have tagged it. Started burying them after I had a coyote run off with one last year. That was a site to see as well. Never know what you will see in the wee hours of the morning.

We saw a small seal 4-5' long swimming just inside the rocks at the 4th island last winter during rock season. Later in the morning, we saw him basking in the sun on the same rocks. A harbor seal perhaps?

Garland

I saw that bad boy about 3 weeks ago sunning itself way farther in from where you saw it. Had to be the same one, let's face it....how many of them could there be this early, up in Lynnhaven? I mentioned this to some friends that live on the water close to where I spotted it and they thought I was losing my mind!!!!!


Jorge

You probably saw a harbor seal or an ice seal. I saw one last week at Little Creek. I spoke with one of the Curators at Virginia Aquarium. It has been a weird summer. Seals have been spotted as far south as the Carribean. They have no idea what is causing this.

More than likely an Otter. They used to get in my live bait pens at night and eat all the spots. Now I have to use electrical wire ties to secure the lid to prevent their entry.