A quantitative, hierarchical approach for detecting drift dives and tracking buoyancy changes in southern elephant seals.

ABSTRACT: Foraging behaviour of marine predators inferred from the analysis of horizontal or vertical movements commonly lack quantitative information about foraging success. Several marine mammal species are known to perform dives where they passively drift in the water column, termed "drift" dives. The drift rate is determined by the animal's buoyancy, which can be used to make inference regarding body condition. Long term dive records retrieved via satellite uplink are often summarized before transmission. This loss of resolution hampers identification of drift dives. Here, we develop a flexible, hierarchically structured approach to identify drift dives and estimate the drift rate from the summarized time-depth profiles that are increasingly available to the global research community. Based on h

SUBMITTER: Arce F 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6586652 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature