Habitat suitability of cetaceans in the Gulf of Mexico using an ecological niche modeling approach.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The Gulf of Mexico (GOM) is a semi-enclosed sea where the waters of the United States, Mexico and Cuba converge. Al least 21 species of cetaceans inhabit it. The only mysticete (baleen whale) is found in the northeast (U.S. waters). The distribution of the 20 species of odontocetes (toothed cetaceans) is well understood in U.S. waters, but practically unknown in Mexican and Cuban waters. In this study we used sighting data from several odontocete species to construct habitat suitability maps in order to identify geographical regions suitable for high diversity throughout the GOM.

Methods

Historical datasets of georeferenced sightings from across the GOM were used to implement the maximum entropy algorithm (MaxEnt) to model the habitat suitability of each species.

SUBMITTER: Ramirez-Leon MR 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7980700 | biostudies-literature | 2021

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature