Did anyone ever see a seal for once?

[Ezhe]

I've played UrW for many hours like how we here all have done. But I've never seen a seal for just once, not to mention to try to hunt one. But it doesn't matter because there are a lot of other game contents.
Therefore, I didn't think about seal stuffs until that recently I tried an islander and started with an ango. Then it came to me that it might be fun to hunt a seal. Then I began to seriously search the coasts and sea as much as I could but just in vein.
And I can't even find a vedio about hunting seals on Internet, either. They are just as mysterious as Yetis. I began to suspect that if they ever exist. So do anyone know how to find and track a seal or spot where they lives? Do they tend to show up in north or maybe south?

[Basas]

I am fairly sure I saw them both in the north and south. They come out in winter to chill on the coast/ice next to sea but don't seem to wander too far away from the water. Once I hunted one by sneaking/rushing but most of the time they get into traps on the coast where water doesn't freeze in the winter. From my experience best are pit traps right next to the water. Seals sound fun at first but they harass you by knocking your other traps and making noise at night. You can't even run them down like elks or deer since they just dive into the water. Seals are pretty rare though.

[Plotinus]

i've also seen them, including in the most recent version. i build my home next to a sea tile that stays wet all year round and then sometimes while i'm home, i see seals.

[Dungeon Smash]

Not only have I seen them, I've killed them... My seal-tribe hunter happened to establish a camp on the northern coast and a large pod of seals were found inhabiting the area nearby.  They seem to like small rocky island chains near the shore.

they are tough little buggers to kill... they come ashore sometimes, so i endeavored to hide in a ditch near the shoreline, wait for one to come past me, then sprint out and try to cut off its escape back to the water.  They're faster than you'd think, and can take a ton of damage.  By the time I finally got one, he had like 5 javelins sticking out of him and a broken flipper, and i still had to stand there for a while and hammer on him with a club before he finally gave up the ghost.

I gave up hunting them after that - too much effort for too little gain.  Maybe traps would be better?  Perhaps you could use fish as bait?  Not sure if it works or not.

[Plotinus]

I use traps, I put a bear trap right next to the water, no bait. I can't find it in news.txt but I remember when they were added back in 2014, it was discussed on the forums (probably the old forums, I think that was before the move) and I remember Sami said that he didn't want seals to be attracted to the player's food and inclined to steal from them, so they're not attracted by baits either. But it was a long time ago and I could misremember or things could have changed since then.

[JP_Finn]

I’ve had absolutely no difference in baiting seal/bear traps. So I’m inclined to agree with Plotinus about old post.
I’ve placed traps with bait: whole fish, raw meat, modded fish bait(that’s technically a raw fish) on the shore, at location with seals, but not on their tracks... caught maybe 2-3 over several characters and years.
I’ve placed bear traps, unbaited to spots with seal tracks; and caught several. 

[Dungeon Smash]

Welp, no sooner had I posted in this thread.... Guess what I just spotted with my new character 



JP_Finn, do you find that bear traps work the best for trapping them?  Going to try setting some up in the area they hang out.

[Dungeon Smash]

Well, well, well....



Set up a bear trap on the small rock jetty where the seals seem to like to hang out.  And my guy only had 15 trap skill... Baited it with 1 roach and 1 perch, just to see if it might go for different types of fish.  a couple days later... here we are!  Time to train my club skill