Are Antarctic minke whales unusually abundant because of 20th century whaling?

• Main Authors: Kristen C. Ruegg, Eric C. Anderson, C. Scott Baker, Murdoch Vant, Jennifer A. Jackson, Stephen R. Palumbi
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Antarctic marine ecosystem; Antarctic minke whale; coalescent modelling; competi- tive release; effective population size; krill surplus hypothesis; Antarctic; The Antarctic; Tive; Antarc*; Antarctic Minke whale; minke whale
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.667.1865; http://palumbi.stanford.edu/manuscripts/are+antarctic+minke+whales.pdf

Severe declines in megafauna worldwide illuminate the role of top predators in ecosystem structure. In the Antarctic, the Krill Surplus Hypothesis posits that the killing of more than 2 million large whales led to competitive release for smaller krill-eating species like the Antarctic minke whale. I...