French Woman Mistaking a Seal for a Labrador Leaves Internet in Stitches

A video of a French mom forgetting the English word for 'seal' has gone viral with more than 1.9 million views.

In the TikTok video, Alix Weld is filming a seal relaxing in the ocean, when her mother exclaims, "Labrador!"

"What?!" says Alix, while her mother repeats, "A Labrador!"

One user commented, "I love how they chill vertically like that all compact and squished up ughhh."

According to the Sea Life Trust based in Cornwall, England, this behaviour is called 'bottling', "when they bob around vertically or horizontally in the water with just their heads or back above the surface of the water. This is how they rest at sea while out foraging for days at a time."

The trust also reports that seals are amazing divers and have the ability to stay under water for 40 to 45 minutes at a time.

Seals are a protected species in the U.S. under the Marine Mammal Protection Act. The legislation was passed in 1972 in response to a growing concern that the decline in certain marine populations was a result of human activities.

The TikTok video has been viewed 1.9 million times and, despite the French word for seal being 'phoque', many users supported the mom.

One TikToker commented that a seal is a "Labrador of the ocean," while another wrote, "basically a sea Labrador." The French word "phoque" comes from the Latin, as seals are part of the Phocidae family of earless, or 'true' seals, distinguished from sea lions and fur seals by their internal ears.

While a seal is certainly not a Labrador, there is a link between the two species. Both dogs and seals belong to the Caniformia suborder of the Carnivora order of classifications created to identify links between species.

Animal members of the Caniformia suborder include dog-like species including dogs (wolves, foxes and so on), bears, racoons, as well as Pinnipedia, meaning fin or flipper-footed. This group includes seals, walruses and sea lions. Although there is a link between seals and dogs, it is not as strong for example as the link between humans and ape, who are both members of the Hominidae family.

The internet is full of videos of dogs and seals playing together, and there are definitely some similarities between the two animals. Baby seals and young dogs are called "pups", and both animals have large, doleful eyes and are playful and inquisitive.

Newsweek has reached out to Alix Weld for comment.

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