Seascape as an organizing principle for evaluating walrus and seal sea-ice habitat in Beringia

Abstract

The term "seascape", as used here, relates the natural history of ice-dependent pinnipeds to their sea-ice environments at different spatial scales, following concepts of landscape ecology. Habitats are characterized by heterogeneous but repeatable structures of sea ice. As an example, multiple mesoscale (3-50 km) seascapes present conditions for different ecological preferences of five Beringian ice-dependent pinnipeds, as observed during 2006-2009 winter-spring icebreaker cruises. Seascape partitioning concepts are important for understanding and projecting species' responses to change under climate-change scenarios. © 2010 by the American Geophysical Union.