Hawaiian monk seal pup welcomed with open arms at Big Island’s Honokōhau Harbor, but maybe too much?

People are suckers for cuteness. Especially when it’s a young animal. Just look at the craze that captivated the globe with Moo Deng, a baby endangered pygmy hippo born this summer at the Khao Kheow Open Zoo in Thailand.

The cute “bouncy pig” became a viral sensation, so popular that zoo visitation more than doubled from 3,000 people to 6,000 to 7,000 per day during weekends and increased to between 700 and 800 per day during weekdays.

Moo Deng also has 2.7 million TikTok followers.

Her cuteness, popularity and increase in visitation, however, led to some bad behavior. She had water poured on her and objects thrown at her. So for her protection, zoo officials were forced to make some changes.

A 5-month-old endangered Hawaiian monk seal pup that makes her home nearly 6,700 miles to the east in waters off the Big Island is at the center of a situation with some parallels to Moo Deng’s, sans internet icon status.

She’s so cute you just want to snap a picture for social media. She’s also just a baby, so what’s wrong with throwing her a fish or two from time to time? People want to see her and she enjoys seeing them.

The monk seal pup tagged number T64/T65 and named Keaka is a frequent visitor to busy Honokōhau Small Boat Harbor in Kona, a sprawling West Hawai‘i harbor and marina that serves hundreds of commercial and recreational vessels.

It’s rocky shores also are popular places from where fishers cast out.

Keaka meeting the people who use and visit the harbor was inevitable, and now her interactions with them are a cause for concern of those who want to protect her. 

Hawaiian monk seals are protected by federal and state laws. Female seals also get an extra measure of care by marine scientists because they are extremely important to building the population of the critically endangered species.

More hands are always better if getting out information and raising awareness is the aim.

So the Hawai‘i Department of Land and Natural Resources Divisions of Aquatic Resources and Boating and Ocean Recreation teamed up with The Marine Mammal Center to step up public outeach and education efforts in response to Keaka’s situation.

Their goal is to remind fishers and boaters at Honokōhau Small Boat Harbor, among other things, not to feed their new marine mammal neighbor and watch out for her.

“She likes to interact with people who are taking pictures of her, and we have been getting reports that she’s being fed, either by coming in and eating the scraps that people are dumping off their boats or by some of the akule fishermen who are throwing her fish,” said Tyler Jeschke, a monitoring technician with the Division of Aquatic Resources, about Keaka.

If interactions like those continue, however, they could result in Keaka becoming conditioned to seek out and rely on people for food, negatively affecting her ability to grow and mature as a wild seal — that’s one of the reasons feeding Hawaiian monk seals is illegal.

“Negative human interactions like crowding and purposeful feeding can alter a young, impressionable seal’s normal foraging behavior and can have lasting consequences to its development and long-term health,” said Megan McGinnis, associate director of Hawai‘i Community Conservation at The Marine Mammal Center. “Responding to, caring for and raising awareness to empower our community on how they can protect endangered Hawaiian monk seals — like Keaka — is at the heart of our one health approach.”

Keaka is drawn to schools of akule, big-eyed scad often referred to as “bait balls,” which she’s found to be an easy and available food source in the harbor.

“Due to the bait ball, Keaka is likely to stick around for a while,” said Jeannine Rossa, acting protected species program lead for the Hawai‘i Department of Land and Natural Resources Division of Aquatic Resources.

Her healthy appetite as a growing young monk seal is a good thing, but it doesn’t just lead her to the bait balls floating near the surface. It brings her into direct contact with fishers and their hooks, too.

The monk seal pup has been hooked twice just this month.

She was reported Nov. 10 to have a hook in the right side of her mouth and monofilament line trailing from her body.

Keaka hauled out 2 days later about 4 miles north up the coast from Honokōhau Harbor at O‘oma, where staff from The Marine Mammal Center’s monk seal hospital and conservation program Ke Kai Ola in Kona successfully removed the hook and monofilament line.

She then got hooked a second time eating a live akule being used as bait.

Fishers are being told that Keaka has been known to take live bait, so they should reel it in when she’s around and be careful not to cast around her or over her.

Rossa and others working to protect Keaka also teamed up with the Division of Boating and Ocean Recreation to provide fishers and boaters with bags for their scraps so they can be put in harbor dumpsters rather than dumped into the water.

“We’re in this for the long run as this seal is likely to stick around well into the new year and certainly for as long as there’s plentiful food for her to snag,” said Rossa. “We hope people will be mindful not to feed her and to slow down and watch for her when entering or exiting the harbor. If we can get everyone to not feed her and to not toss scraps into the water, we hope she leaves on her own.”

Division of Boating and Ocean Recreation staff have been instrumental in spreading the word at the harbor.

They’re showing Division of Aquatic Resources staff where to post educational signs to maximize outreach and education and work closely with regular harbor users.

“I’m talking to people I know, especially the fishermen, because I know people have been illegally putting things in the water like fish scraps,” said Honokōhau Small Boat Harbor Master David LeDuc. “So, I’m like, hey, get the word out to your buddies, and they’re all about it. They want to be helpful.”

Jeschke is one of the people now making regular outreach trips to Honokōhau Harbor.

“We’re just making sure that, especially with all the boat traffic and the fishermen, she’s staying safe, and people are acting accordingly because of her presence,” said Jeschke.

He finds people generally very receptive of the message.

“Monk seal pups are cute animals. They’re very endearing, so I think a lot of people want to help them, especially because Keaka is so young and curious,” Jeschke said. “I think we’re going in a good direction right now, despite the few folks who don’t want to listen or cooperate.”