Wednesday March 5, 2025
Oceanographic —
Gathering populations of northern elephant seals could hold the secret to measuring fish abundance across the vast Pacific Ocean and deep within its ‘twilight zones’ – a feat that was previously impossible by marine researchers looking to better understand fish stocks.
This is the latest development from a 60-year study in which marine biologists from UC Santa Cruz have been monitoring the behaviour of northern elephant seals as they journey to the nearby Año Nuevo Natural Reserve.
Over the course of six decades, generations of researchers have been able to amass some 350,000 observations on more than 50,000 seals who – over the years – have gathered by their thousands to breed and molt.
Now – and thanks to the development of new technologies – researchers have been able to extend those observations into the waters of the Pacific Ocean, monitoring the behaviour of tagged individual seals to gather real-time data on their fitness, foraging success, at-sea behaviour, and population dynamics.