Incidental Sighting of a Ribbon Seal (Phoca fasciata) in the Western Beaufort Sea

• Main Authors: Sue E. Moore, Edith I. Barrowclough
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Bering Sea; Chukchi Sea; Arctic; Beaufort Sea; Chukchi; Sea ice
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.490.1971; http://pubs.aina.ucalgary.ca/arctic/Arctic37-3-290.pdf

On 29 August 1983, an adult ribbon seal (Phocufusciutu) was a contributing factor. The observed ribbon seal may have seen by one of us (EIB) resting on ice in the western Beaufort drifted north and east with the ice from the Chukchi Sea during Sea (71”41’N, 152’41’”; Fig. 11, during the course of an the summer. To our knowledge, this report constitutes the.aerial survey. The seal did not move from the ice when over-flown at 200 m, and was positively identified by its distinctive pelage. Ribbon seals are commonly found along the ice front in the Bering Sea in winter and early spring, then disperse in late spring as the sea ice breaks up and presumably become solitary and pelagic with poorly known distribution in the summer