WATERVILLE -- Shortly after 5 Friday night, Jen Clowes, of Waterville, was getting out of work at HealthReach in the Hathaway Building, on the shores of the Kennebec River. She walked to her car at the back of the parking lot.

Lying on the ground just a couple of feet away, beneath a streetlight, was a small seal. A half-dozen people soon gathered around the seal and Waterville police officers hung yellow caution tape along the lot's edge.

Just under two hours later, Lynda Doughty, a coordinator and biologist for the Maine Department of Marine Resources, arrived from Bath in a blue pickup truck with a caged carrier. Doughty and the seal regarded each other; she used a flashlight to examine its face and body. Doughty then hung a piece of clothing above its head, and the seal snorted and snapped up at it.

The seal's mouth was torn and bleeding; it appeared to be thinner than it should be for being 5 or 6 months old and its left eye appeared inflamed or infected, Doughty said.

With the help of Waterville police officers, she wrapped the clothing over the seal and hoisted it into the carrier, which was then placed in the truck's passenger seat. The rescue had been successful.

"Let's hope he's OK," Doughty said of the seal, which she determined was male.

The seal's rescue Friday night capped two days' worth of sightings; the seal was first spotted in Winslow on Thanksgiving. Gerald Cates. of Waterville, had decided to drive over to Fort Halifax Park around 11:30 Thursday morning to see how high the water level had gotten in the Kennebec. As he walked in the park, Cates saw a surprising sight: There was a man by the shore and the seal was lying on the ground beside him.

The man wanted to empty his coffee cup and pour water on the seal, Cates said, but he stopped him and called police on his cell phone.

"I'm a pretty active sportsman and conservationist, and I don't how to handle a seal," Cates said.

A small crowd had gathered to check out the seal by the time Winslow Police Officer Josh Veilleux arrived. The man who initially saw the seal thought it had been a large beaver at first, Veilleux said, and the seal came right up to him.

As Veilleux drove to the park, "I was like, 'Someone's playing a joke on me; it doesn't sound right.' I responded with apprehension," the officer recalled Friday.

But sure enough, there was a small seal on the grass beside a log when he arrived.

Veilleux contacted the Maine Warden Service, which put him in touch with Doughty.

But the seal had returned to the river and was out of sight by the time she arrived at about 12:30.

There were no more reports of the seal until it appeared Friday night near the Hathaway Building, apparently climbing a steep embankment of rocks to get to where it was found.

In the Gulf of Maine, there are three species of seals: gray, harp and harbor. The harbor is most common and is known for its willingness to travel. They travel between land and sea and can weigh several hundred pounds.

Harbor seals can be found in just about every harbor along Maine's coast, from Kittery to Eastport, according to the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife. Harbor seals only stick with their mothers for about four weeks, Doughty said.

Doughty said it's not unheard of to see seals travel inland from the coast, in fresh water, though there are typically not many locations where they're able to come ashore. So far this year, the Department of Marine Resources has received more than 350 reports of whales, seals, dolphins, porpoises or sea turtles outside of their normal habitats.

"There are a handful a year," Doughty said of finding seals traveling up rivers and inland. "Although it's not common, we do sometimes get calls of wayward animals."

Fort Halifax Park has been the scene of seal sightings in recent years, most likely because it's one of the few spots along the Kennebec River that's easily accessible to them, Doughty said.

Doughty said Friday night she would drive straight down to a rehabilitation center in Biddeford. Rehabilitation typically takes two to three months, Doughty said, and the seal would most likely be released back into the ocean in the Biddeford area.

Scott Monroe -- 487-3288, 861-9253

smonroe@centralmaine.com