Riot shields and good balance: managing New Zealand’s booming fur seal population

Before humans came to New Zealand, millions of fur seals populated the coastline. Populations were hunted nearly to extinction, but since they became a protected species their numbers have flourished. Photograph: Naomi Haussmann

On the coastline around Kaikōura, the rocks seem to be moving. Jutting from the sea, shimmering in the summer heat, their grey planes begin to shift and ripple.

Step closer and you recognise them, first by their sound: a distant honking, barking, yelping. Then, by their smell: thick and potent, a mixture of kelp and excrement. Seals, hundreds of them, possibly thousands, are coming ashore for pupping. They roll in constant, joyful helixes in the rock pools, emerge from the sea to glisten like puddles of oil, or bask unmoving in the sun like comatose adolescents recovering from a hangover.