At surface behaviour at location on spot and dive depth profile data of southern elephant seals from Marion Island 2006 - 2013

• Main Authors: McIntyre, Trevor, Bester, Marthán Nieuwoudt, Bornemann, Horst, Tosh, Cheryl Ann, de Bruyn, P J Nico
• Format: Dataset
• Language: English
• Published: PANGAEA 2017
• Subjects: Marine Mammal Tracking; MMT; Elephant Seals; Marion Island; Southern Elephant Seals
• Online Access: https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.871448; https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.871448

Long-term fidelity to foraging areas may have fitness benefits to individuals, particularly in unpredictable environments. However, such strategies may result in short-term energetic losses and delay responses to fast environmental changes. We used satellite tracking data and associated diving data to record the habitat use of nine individual southern elephant seals over 34 winter migrations. By assessing overlap in two- and three-dimensional home ranges we illustrate strong long-term (up to 7-year) fidelity to foraging habitat. Furthermore, a repeatability statistic and hierarchical clustering exercise provided evidence for individual specialization of foraging migration strategies.We discuss the possible influences of stable long-term foraging migration strategies on the adaptability of individual elephant seals to rapid environmental change. Our results further illustrate the need for more long-term longitudinal studies to quantify the influence of individual-level site familiarity, fidelity and specialization on population-level resource selection and population dynamics.