and Hoggard 2000). The western North Atlantic

• Main Authors: Stock Definition, Geographic Range
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: 2003
• Subjects: PRODUCTIVITY RATES; North Atlantic
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.227.9391; http://www.nefsc.noaa.gov/nefsc/publications/tm/tm182/pdfs/48.pdf

The melon-headed whale is distributed worldwide in tropical to sub-tropical waters (Jefferson et al. 1994). A group of melon-headed whales was sighted during both a 1999 (20 whales) and 2002 (80 whales) vessel survey of the western North Atlantic off of Cape Hatteras, North Carolina in waters>2500 m deep (Figure 1; Anon. 1999: Anon. 2002). Melon-headed whales are assumed to be part of the cetacean fauna of the tropical western North Atlantic. The paucity of sightings is probably due to a naturally low number of groups compared to other 40 cetacean species. Sightings in the more extensively surveyed northern Gulf of Mexico occur in oceanic waters (Mullin et al. 1994; Mullin and Fulling in review). Sightings of melon-headed whales in the northern