|
Phoca
''Phoca'' ( ) is a genus of the earless seals, within the family Phocidae, source of the French name for seal, 'phoque'. It now contains just two species, the common seal (or harbour seal) and the spotted seal (or largha seal). Several species formerly listed under this genus have been split into the genera ''Pusa'', '' Pagophilus'', and ''Histriophoca''. Until recently, ''Phoca largha'' has been considered a subspecies of ''Phoca vitulina'' but now is considered its own species. For this reason, the fossil history of the genus is unclear, and it has formerly been used as wastebasket taxon for a number of fossils of uncertain affinity. Species Currently there are two members: Former members of ''Phoca'': * ''Histriophoca fasciata'' (ribbon seal) * ''Pusa caspica'' (Caspian seal) * ''Pusa hispida'' (ringed seal) * ''Pusa sibirica'' (nerpa or Baikal seal) * ''Pagophilus groenlandica'' (harp seal) Mating ecology Both harbour and spotted seals are aquatically mating pinnipeds. M ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Common Seal
The harbor (or harbour) seal (''Phoca vitulina''), also known as the common seal, is a true seal found along temperate and Arctic marine coastlines of the Northern Hemisphere. The most widely distributed species of pinnipeds, pinniped (walruses, eared seals, and true seals), they are found in coastal waters of the northern Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Oceans, Baltic Sea, Baltic and North Seas. Harbor seals are brown, silvery white, tan, or gray, with distinctive V-shaped nostrils. An adult can attain a length of 1.85 m (6.1 ft) and a mass of up to . Blubber under the seal's skin helps to maintain body temperature. Females outlive males (30–35 years versus 20–25 years). Harbor seals stick to familiar resting spots or haulout sites, generally rocky areas (although ice, sand, and mud may also be used) where they are protected from adverse weather conditions and predation, near a foraging area. Males may fight over mates under water and on land. Females bear a sin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Phoca Vitulina
The harbor (or harbour) seal (''Phoca vitulina''), also known as the common seal, is a true seal found along temperate and Arctic marine coastlines of the Northern Hemisphere. The most widely distributed species of pinniped (walruses, eared seals, and true seals), they are found in coastal waters of the northern Atlantic, Pacific Oceans, Baltic and North Seas. Harbor seals are brown, silvery white, tan, or gray, with distinctive V-shaped nostrils. An adult can attain a length of 1.85 m (6.1 ft) and a mass of up to . Blubber under the seal's skin helps to maintain body temperature. Females outlive males (30–35 years versus 20–25 years). Harbor seals stick to familiar resting spots or haulout sites, generally rocky areas (although ice, sand, and mud may also be used) where they are protected from adverse weather conditions and predation, near a foraging area. Males may fight over mates under water and on land. Females bear a single pup after a nine-month gestation, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Phoca Largha Bering Sea 2
''Phoca'' ( ) is a genus of the earless seals, within the family Phocidae, source of the French name for seal, 'phoque'. It now contains just two species, the common seal (or harbour seal) and the spotted seal (or largha seal). Several species formerly listed under this genus have been split into the genera ''Pusa'', '' Pagophilus'', and '' Histriophoca''. Until recently, ''Phoca largha'' has been considered a subspecies of ''Phoca vitulina'' but now is considered its own species. For this reason, the fossil history of the genus is unclear, and it has formerly been used as wastebasket taxon for a number of fossils of uncertain affinity. Species Currently there are two members: Former members of ''Phoca'': * ''Histriophoca fasciata'' (ribbon seal) * ''Pusa caspica'' (Caspian seal) * ''Pusa hispida'' (ringed seal) * ''Pusa sibirica'' (nerpa or Baikal seal) * ''Pagophilus groenlandica'' (harp seal) Mating ecology Both harbour and spotted seals are aquatically mating pinnipeds. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Earless Seal
The earless seals, phocids or true seals are one of the three main groups of mammals within the seal lineage, Pinnipedia. All true seals are members of the family Phocidae (). They are sometimes called crawling seals to distinguish them from the fur seals and sea lions of the family Otariidae. Seals live in the oceans of both hemispheres and, with the exception of the more tropical monk seals, are mostly confined to polar, subpolar, and temperate climates. The Baikal seal is the only species of exclusively freshwater seal. Taxonomy and evolution Evolution The earliest known fossil earless seal is ''Noriphoca gaudini'' from the late Oligocene or earliest Miocene ( Aquitanian) of Italy. Other early fossil phocids date from the mid-Miocene, 15 million years ago in the north Atlantic. Until recently, many researchers believed that phocids evolved separately from otariids and odobenids; and that they evolved from otter-like animals, such as ''Potamotherium'', which inhabited E ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Harp Seal
The harp seal (''Pagophilus groenlandicus''), also known as Saddleback Seal or Greenland Seal, is a species of earless seal, or true seal, native to the northernmost Atlantic Ocean and Arctic Ocean. Originally in the genus ''Phoca'' with a number of other species, it was reclassified into the monotypic genus ''Pagophilus'' in 1844. In Greek, its scientific name translates to "ice-lover from Greenland," and its taxonomic synonym, ''Phoca groenlandica'' translates to "Greenlandic seal." This is the only species in the genus ''Pagophilus''. Description The mature harp seal has pure black eyes. It has a silver-gray fur covering its body, with black harp or wishbone-shaped markings dorsally. Adult harp seals grow to be long and weigh from . The harp seal pup often has a yellow-white coat at birth due to staining from amniotic fluid, but after one to three days, the coat turns white and stays white for 2–3 weeks, until the first molt. Adolescent harp seals have a silver-gray coat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pinniped
Pinnipeds (pronounced ), commonly known as seals, are a widely distributed and diverse clade of carnivorous, fin-footed, semiaquatic, mostly marine mammals. They comprise the extant families Odobenidae (whose only living member is the walrus), Otariidae (the eared seals: sea lions and fur seals), and Phocidae (the earless seals, or true seals). There are 34 extant species of pinnipeds, and more than 50 extinct species have been described from fossils. While seals were historically thought to have descended from two ancestral lines, molecular evidence supports them as a monophyletic lineage (descended from one ancestral line). Pinnipeds belong to the order Carnivora; their closest living relatives are musteloids (weasels, raccoons, skunks, and red pandas), having diverged about 50 million years ago. Seals range in size from the and Baikal seal to the and southern elephant seal male, which is also the largest member of the order Carnivora. Several species exh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Caspian Seal
The Caspian seal (''Pusa caspica'', syn. ''Phoca caspica'') is one of the smallest members of the earless seal family and unique in that it is found exclusively in the brackish Caspian Sea. It lives along the shorelines, but also on the many rocky islands and floating blocks of ice that dot the Caspian Sea. In winter and cooler parts of the spring and autumn season, it populates the northern Caspian coastline. As the ice melts in the summer and warmer parts of the spring and autumn season, it also occurs in the deltas of the Volga and Ural Rivers, as well as the southern latitudes of the Caspian where the water is cooler due to greater depth. Evidence suggests the seals are descended from Arctic ringed seals that reached the area from the north during an earlier part of the Quaternary period and became isolated in the landlocked Caspian Sea when continental ice sheets melted. Description Adults are about in length. Males are longer than females at an early age, but females exp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ringed Seal
The ringed seal (''Pusa hispida'') is an earless seal inhabiting the Arctic and sub-Arctic regions. The ringed seal is a relatively small seal, rarely greater than 1.5 m in length, with a distinctive patterning of dark spots surrounded by light gray rings, hence its common name. It is the most abundant and wide-ranging ice seal in the Northern Hemisphere, ranging throughout the Arctic Ocean, into the Bering Sea and Okhotsk Sea as far south as the northern coast of Japan in the Pacific and throughout the North Atlantic coasts of Greenland and Scandinavia as far south as Newfoundland, and including two freshwater subspecies in northern Europe. Ringed seals are one of the primary prey of polar bears and killer whales, and have long been a component of the diet of indigenous people of the Arctic. Ringed seals are the smallest and most abundant member of the seal family that live in the Arctic and Sub-Arctic regions. The average life span of a ringed seal is 40 years, with a diet b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hauling-out
Hauling-out is a behaviour associated with pinnipeds (true seals, sea lions, fur seals and walruses) temporarily leaving the water. Hauling-out typically occurs between periods of foraging activity. Rather than remain in the water, pinnipeds haul-out onto land or sea-ice for reasons such as reproduction and rest. Hauling-out is necessary in seals for mating (with the exception of the Baikal seal) and giving birth (although a distinction is generally made between reproductive aggregations, termed "rookeries", and non-reproductive aggregations, termed "haul-outs"). Other benefits of hauling-out may include predator avoidance, thermoregulation, social activity, parasite reduction and rest. There is much variation in haul-out patterns among different seal species.Hoelzel, A. Rus. (2002). ''Marine Mammal Biology: An Evolutionary Approach''. Blackwell Publishing. . p. 197. Haul-out sites may be segregated by age and sex within the same species. Many species of pinniped have only a fe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Spotted Seal
The spotted seal (''Phoca largha''), also known as the larga seal or largha seal, is a member of the family Phocidae, and is considered a "true seal". It inhabits ice floes and waters of the north Pacific Ocean and adjacent seas. It is primarily found along the continental shelf of the Beaufort, Chukchi, Bering and Okhotsk Seas and south to the northern Yellow Sea and it migrates south as far as northern Huanghai and the western Sea of Japan. It is also found in Alaska from the southeastern Bristol Bay to Demarcation Point during the ice-free seasons of summer and autumn when spotted seals mate and have pups. Smaller numbers are found in the Beaufort Sea. It is sometimes mistaken for the harbor seal to which it is closely related and spotted seals and harbor seals often mingle together in areas where their habitats overlap. The reduction in arctic ice floes due to global warming led to concerns that the spotted seal was threatened with extinction. Studies were conducted on ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Baikal Seal
The Baikal seal, Lake Baikal seal or (''Pusa sibirica''), is a species of earless seal endemic to Lake Baikal in Siberia, Russia. Like the Caspian seal, it is related to the Arctic ringed seal. The Baikal seal is one of the smallest true seals and the only exclusively freshwater pinniped species.Randall R. Reeves, Brent S. Stewart, Phillip J. clapham, James A. Powell, ''"National Audubon Society Guide to the Marine Mammals of the World"'', Alfred A. Knopf publishing, New York, 2002 A subpopulation of inland harbour seals living in the Hudson Bay region of Quebec, Canada (Lacs des Loups Marins harbour seals), as well as the Saimaa ringed seal and the Ladoga seal (both ringed seal subspecies), are also found in fresh water, but these seals are part of species that also have marine populations. The most recent population estimates are 80,000 to 100,000 animals, roughly equaling the expected carrying capacity of the lake. At present, the species is not considered threatened. Descrip ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pusa
''Pusa'' is a genus of the earless seals, within the family Phocidae. The three species of this genus were split from the genus ''Phoca'', and some sources still give ''Phoca'' as an acceptable synonym for ''Pusa''. The three species in this genus are found in Arctic and subarctic regions, as well as around the Caspian Sea. This includes these countries and regions: Russia, Finland, Scandinavia, Great Britain, Britain, Greenland, Canada, the United States, Iran, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and Japan. Due to changing local environmental conditions, the ringed seals found in the Canadian region has varied patterns of growth. The northern Canadian ringed seals grow slowly to a larger size, while the southern seals grow quickly to a smaller size. Only the Caspian seal species of ''Pusa'' is endangered, while two subspecies of the ringed seal are Vulnerable species, vulnerable and endangered, Ladoga seal and Saimaa ringed seal respectively. Taxonomy Species References * Ph ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
