Habitat suitability modeling in different sperm whale social groups

• Published in: The Journal of Wildlife Management
• Main Authors: Pace D. S., Arcangeli A., Mussi B., Vivaldi C., Ledon C., Lagorio S., Giacomini G., Pavan G., Ardizzone G.
• Other Authors: Pace, D. S., Arcangeli, A., Mussi, B., Vivaldi, C., Ledon, C., Lagorio, S., Giacomini, G., Pavan, G., Ardizzone, G.
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: 2018
• Subjects: conservation ecology; MaxEnt; Maximum entropy modeling; Mediterranean Sea; Physeter macrocephalus; Sperm whale
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/11571/1304786; https://doi.org/10.1002/jwmg.21453; http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1002/(ISSN)1937-2817

The identi®cation of signi®cant habitats for highly mobile marine vertebrates is essential for their conservation. Evidence is often dif®cult to obtain for deep-diving species such as sperm whales (Physeter macrocephalus), where standard visual survey methods are not suf®cient to detect the species. Sperm whales rely on sound for most of their activities, so acoustics is a crucial tool to locate them in the environment and collect information about their daily life. We used a maximum entropy (MaxEnt) modeling approach to predict potential habitats for sperm whales during 2007±2015 in an area of the Mediterranean Sea (characterized by submarine canyon systems) where sperm whale singletons, social units of females and calves, and clusters with immature males, were regularly encountered in sympatry.