Long-Term Population Trends of Patagonian Marine Mammals and Their Ecosystem Interactions in the Context of Climate Change

Abstract

Marine mammals that live in the Patagonian shelf include several species of pinnipeds and cetaceans, most of which extend their distribution ranges to tropical or subtropical seas, through subantarctic waters, or beyond the shelf in deep ocean waters, all of them in the Southwestern Atlantic (SWA) ocean. The pinnipeds include the South American sea lion Otaria favescens, the South American fur seal Arctocephalus australis, and the southern elephant seal Mirounga leonina, which live, feed, and breed in local populations in the Argentine sea or are part of larger distribution ranges (Crespo et al. 2007). Antarctic seals (crabeater Lobodon carcinophagus, Weddell Leptonychotes weddellii, and leopard seal Hydrurga leptonyx) and Antarctic Arctocephalus gazelle and subantarctic Arctocephalus tropicalis fur seals pass through the Argentine sea as erratic individuals (Crespo 2009).