Corkscrew seals : grey seal (Halichoerus grypus) infanticide and cannibalism may indicate the cause of spiral lacerations in seals.
Large numbers of dead seals with characteristic spiral lesions have been washing ashore around the North Atlantic over the past two decades. Interactions with ship propellers and shark predation have been suggested as the likely causal mechanisms. However, new evidence points towards a more likely c...
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Online Access: | http://dro.dur.ac.uk/24880/ http://dro.dur.ac.uk/24880/1/24880.pdf https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0156464 |
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ftunivdurham:oai:dro.dur.ac.uk.OAI2:24880 2023-05-15T17:33:05+02:00 Corkscrew seals : grey seal (Halichoerus grypus) infanticide and cannibalism may indicate the cause of spiral lacerations in seals. Brownlow, Andrew Onoufriou, Joseph Bishop, Amanda Davison, Nicholas Thompson, Dave 2016-06-02 application/pdf http://dro.dur.ac.uk/24880/ http://dro.dur.ac.uk/24880/1/24880.pdf https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0156464 unknown Public Library of Science dro:24880 issn:1932-6203 doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0156464 http://dro.dur.ac.uk/24880/ https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0156464 http://dro.dur.ac.uk/24880/1/24880.pdf © 2016 Brownlow et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. CC-BY PLoS ONE, 2016, Vol.11(6), pp.e0156464 [Peer Reviewed Journal] Article PeerReviewed 2016 ftunivdurham https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0156464 2020-06-04T22:24:40Z Large numbers of dead seals with characteristic spiral lesions have been washing ashore around the North Atlantic over the past two decades. Interactions with ship propellers and shark predation have been suggested as the likely causal mechanisms. However, new evidence points towards a more likely candidate: grey seal predation. An adult male grey seal was observed and recorded catching, killing and eating five weaned grey seal pups over a period of one week on the Isle of May, Scotland. A further 9 carcasses found in the same area exhibited similar injuries. Post mortem analysis of lesions indicated the wound characteristics were similar to each other and in 12 of the 14 carcasses analysed, were indistinguishable from carcasses previously attributed to propeller interaction. We therefore propose that most of the seal carcasses displaying spiral lacerations in the UK are caused by grey seal predation. Cases in other locations should be re-evaluated using the scoring system presented here to identify whether grey seal predation is a major cause of mortality in phocid seals. Article in Journal/Newspaper North Atlantic Durham University: Durham Research Online PLOS ONE 11 6 e0156464 |
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Durham University: Durham Research Online |
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ftunivdurham |
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description |
Large numbers of dead seals with characteristic spiral lesions have been washing ashore around the North Atlantic over the past two decades. Interactions with ship propellers and shark predation have been suggested as the likely causal mechanisms. However, new evidence points towards a more likely candidate: grey seal predation. An adult male grey seal was observed and recorded catching, killing and eating five weaned grey seal pups over a period of one week on the Isle of May, Scotland. A further 9 carcasses found in the same area exhibited similar injuries. Post mortem analysis of lesions indicated the wound characteristics were similar to each other and in 12 of the 14 carcasses analysed, were indistinguishable from carcasses previously attributed to propeller interaction. We therefore propose that most of the seal carcasses displaying spiral lacerations in the UK are caused by grey seal predation. Cases in other locations should be re-evaluated using the scoring system presented here to identify whether grey seal predation is a major cause of mortality in phocid seals. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Brownlow, Andrew Onoufriou, Joseph Bishop, Amanda Davison, Nicholas Thompson, Dave |
spellingShingle |
Brownlow, Andrew Onoufriou, Joseph Bishop, Amanda Davison, Nicholas Thompson, Dave Corkscrew seals : grey seal (Halichoerus grypus) infanticide and cannibalism may indicate the cause of spiral lacerations in seals. |
author_facet |
Brownlow, Andrew Onoufriou, Joseph Bishop, Amanda Davison, Nicholas Thompson, Dave |
author_sort |
Brownlow, Andrew |
title |
Corkscrew seals : grey seal (Halichoerus grypus) infanticide and cannibalism may indicate the cause of spiral lacerations in seals. |
title_short |
Corkscrew seals : grey seal (Halichoerus grypus) infanticide and cannibalism may indicate the cause of spiral lacerations in seals. |
title_full |
Corkscrew seals : grey seal (Halichoerus grypus) infanticide and cannibalism may indicate the cause of spiral lacerations in seals. |
title_fullStr |
Corkscrew seals : grey seal (Halichoerus grypus) infanticide and cannibalism may indicate the cause of spiral lacerations in seals. |
title_full_unstemmed |
Corkscrew seals : grey seal (Halichoerus grypus) infanticide and cannibalism may indicate the cause of spiral lacerations in seals. |
title_sort |
corkscrew seals : grey seal (halichoerus grypus) infanticide and cannibalism may indicate the cause of spiral lacerations in seals. |
publisher |
Public Library of Science |
publishDate |
2016 |
url |
http://dro.dur.ac.uk/24880/ http://dro.dur.ac.uk/24880/1/24880.pdf https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0156464 |
genre |
North Atlantic |
genre_facet |
North Atlantic |
op_source |
PLoS ONE, 2016, Vol.11(6), pp.e0156464 [Peer Reviewed Journal] |
op_relation |
dro:24880 issn:1932-6203 doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0156464 http://dro.dur.ac.uk/24880/ https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0156464 http://dro.dur.ac.uk/24880/1/24880.pdf |
op_rights |
© 2016 Brownlow et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0156464 |
container_title |
PLOS ONE |
container_volume |
11 |
container_issue |
6 |
container_start_page |
e0156464 |
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