Dare to differ : individual foraging success in marine predators, from the largest seal to small penguins ...

• Main Author: Goulet, Pauline
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: The University of St Andrews 2021
• Subjects: QL713.2G7; Marine mammals > Antarctic Ocean > Monitoring; Predatory marine animals > Antarctic Ocean > Monitoring; Southern elephant seal > Food; Antarctic fur seal > Food; Penguins > Food; Antarc*; Antarctic; Antarctic Fur Seal; Antarctic Ocean; Elephant Seal; Elephant Seals; Southern Elephant Seal; Southern Elephant Seals; Southern Ocean
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.17630/sta/975; https://research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk/handle/10023/30125

The oceans are undergoing rapid alterations due to human activities, making it crucial to predict how ecosystem shifts will affect marine predators. Short-term indicators of the fitness consequences of a changing environment, such as individual foraging performance, are essential to guide timely conservation measures but there is a dearth of methods for quantifying the individual foraging strategies and efficiency of aquatic animals. This thesis documents the development of three innovative multi-sensor biologging devices and explores their application to uncover the foraging performance of Southern Ocean predators. A tag containing wide-bandwidth light and movement sensors was developed to measure anti-predator bioluminescent signals emitted by prey as they are hunted by southern elephant seals. Results indicate that some seals target large aggregations of bioluminescent prey, but inter-individual variability is wide. The need for details on the prey size, quality and ease of capture prompted the ...