How marine mammals help to gather important ocean data

Comments

• Sou

  August 2016

  What a fantastic article, Baerbel. How could I have missed it. I didn't know about the use of seals in finding channels in Antarctica. Wonderful stuff.
  
  This link to Movebank from the bottom of the SkS article is brilliant, too. It shows animals being tracked all over the world.

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• BaerbelW

  August 2016

  Thanks, Sou!
  
  In case you are interested, here is the backstory of how this article actually came to pass:
  
  Dr. Martin Wikelski - who leads the Max Planck Institute for Ornithology (Radolfzell), Radolfzell gave a talk at the annual nature conservation meeting in Radolfzell (southern Germany at Lake Constanze) mainly talking about the radiotagging he does with all kinds of animals (from birds, to bats, to goats - the latter in an effort to hopefully be able to predict eruptions of Mt. Etna based on the goats' movements). During the talk he mentioned that seals are now also providing climate data which obviously peeked my interest.
  
  So, I sent him an email asking for more information about this project and within a day or two he sent me some related studies and contact information for Dan Costa's team in CA. I touched base with them as well, got more studies and other material (like the pictures for the post) and took it from there. Along the way, I also had contact with the Argo-team at UCSD which resulted in jg's neat graphics now being featured on their page.
  
  So, all in all a very satisfying experience as it shows how suprisingly easy it is to get in direct touch with scientists from all over the world!
  

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• BaerbelW

  August 2016

  Here is some new research done with the help of radio-tagged seals, also around Antarctica:
  Elephant Seals' Dives Show Slowdown in Ocean Circulation
  
  

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• Sou

  August 2016

  That's an interesting article, Baerbel. There's been talk about the slowing up in the northern hemisphere, not so much talk about down south. Probably because more people live in the NH, plus it's more accessible.

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• dcpetterson

  August 2016

  Those are excellent articles Baerbel, and a great story too of how the SkS article came about. 

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• citizenschallenge

  August 2016

  Fascinating.  Amazing what them scientists dream of.
  Seems like a good excuse to try embedding an image.
  
  
  

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