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Staffers at the Meadowlands Commission captured this image of a Harbor Seal resting on the docks at River Barge Park in Carsltadt

(Photo by Courtesy Jim Wright/NJMC)

CARLSTADT — There was but one misguided sunbather in the wind and rain out in the Meadowlands Tuesday morning, and he didn't seem to mind.

Staffers at the New Jersey Meadowlands Commission spotted a content-looking male harbor seal on the rowing docks at River Barge Park — a rare, but not unprecedented sight along the Hackensack River.

"People say they see them from time to time, but I've been here the last five years and this is first I've seen one," said Jim Wright, a communications officer with the commission.

Wright sent the pictures to the Marine Mammal Stranding Center, concerned that the seal might be injured or stranded.

"They said, nah it's fine, looks great," he said.

Robert Schoelkopf, the center's director, told Wright that mild weather has kept seals out in the waters around New Jersey. They travel down the Atlantic Ocean toward Jersey in the winter, sometimes venturing up rivers like the Hackensack in search of herring and mackerel.

"Just look at it this way," he wrote, "they gave the Meadowlands their seal of approval."

For more photos and a Q&A with an expert from the Marine Mammal Stranding Center in Brigantine, visit The Meadowlands Nature Blog.