Elephant Seals Provide New Oceanographic Data
15.08.2007 - Logistics, Other
An international team of scientists, including UK scientists from the University of St Andrew and the British Antarctic Survey has used sensors attached to the head of 85 elephant seals to obtain new information on seal behaviour and new oceanographic data.
The seals were tagged at the islands of South Georgia, Kerguelen and Macquarie in the Southern Ocean, and at the western coast of the Antarctic Peninsula. The data transmitted back to land via satellite show that elephant seals adopted different behaviours and strategies to find food, depending on which colonies they belonged to.
The seals were also used as samplers to obtain oceanographic data about the Southern Ocean, one of the harshest and remote places in the world to collect data. Researchers were able to study how changes in salinity and temperature affect changes in the movement of water at different depths. This is important from a biological point of view, as they were able to study the habits and the habitats both of the elephant seal and its prey species. Moreover, the knowledge gained is also significantly enhancing our understanding of the processes of heat exchange within the Southern Ocean and between this region and the rest of the world.
More information can be found on the website of the SEaOS project (Southern Elephant Seals as Oceanographic Samplers).
