Fur seals belong to the group known as the Otarid or "eared" seals, this group contains fur seals and sea-lions that have a visible earflap.Antarctic fur seals are more accurately called "Southern fur seals". In appearance and manner they resemble a large dog (albeit a funny shaped one). They are able to bring their rear flippers under their body and take the weight of their body on their fore-flippers and so are much more agile on land compared to others such as elephant, weddell and crabeater seals.
The males can reach 200kg (440lb) and can be up to 4 times larger than the females. They are restricted mainly to the sub-Antarctic islands, with 95% of the worlds population being found on the island of South Georgia.