When a vulnerable baby seal showed up alone on crowded Wells Beach on Monday, things could’ve ended badly. But instead, a happy ending was captured on video after the pup was brought to another beach and eagerly crawled back into the water.

Beachgoers started reporting the tiny pup’s presence around 6 a.m. to Marine Mammals of Maine, a group that cares for sick and stranded marine animals from Kittery to Rockland. People were so concerned that Marine Mammals got 15 to 20 calls about it, said assistant stranding coordinator Dominique Walk.

“The seal was right in front of the parking lot for that beach. Even at 6 in the morning, there were a lot of people there,” Walk said. That was dangerous for the seal because it increased the risk that someone would harm it. Even well-meaning people can interfere with seals’ natural behavior by touching them or pushing them back into the water.

Trained wildlife workers from Marine Mammals moved the pup to a quieter area where it wouldn’t be at risk from humans. “We try not to move them too far from where they originally got stranded. We moved this one a few towns over,” Walk said.

Then the seal happily went back into the ocean on its own, which the Wells Police Department recorded on video.

Wells police have been posting frequently on Facebook about seals on the beach, warning beachgoers to stay away from them. Walk says there have been a lot of seals on Wells Beach this summer, but that’s not unusual.

“Wells Beach is such a hot spot,” Walk said. “Because Wells is such a highly used beach, we do have a lot of human interaction cases there. Those range from people petting seals to pouring water on them. A lot of them get pushed into the water. People take selfies with them, take them home,” and all those interactions can cause serious harm to the animals.

Marine Mammals wants to remind beachgoers that seals on beaches aren’t necessarily in distress; they’re often simply resting. It’s illegal to touch, feed, harass or approach marine mammals, and people must stay at least 150 feet away from them. If you see a seal pup by itself on a busy beach, or a larger marine mammal stranded away from water, call Marine Mammals’ stranding hotline at 1-800-532-9551 and keep people and pets away.