Spring haul-out behavior of seals in the Bering and Chukchi Seas: implications for abundance estimation.

ABSTRACT: Ice-associated seals rely on sea ice for a variety of activities, including pupping, breeding, molting, and resting. In the Arctic, many of these activities occur in spring (April through June) as sea ice begins to melt and retreat northward. Rapid acceleration of climate change in Arctic ecosystems is therefore of concern as the quantity and quality of suitable habitat is forecast to decrease. Robust estimates of seal population abundance are needed to properly monitor the impacts of these changes over time. Aerial surveys of seals on ice are an efficient method for counting seals but must be paired with estimates of the proportion of seals out of the water to derive population abundance. In this paper, we use hourly percent-dry data from satellite-linked bio-loggers deployed between 2005

SUBMITTER: London JM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11471145 | biostudies-literature | 2024

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature