Identifying important habitat for northern bottlenose and Sowerby's beaked whales in the western North Atlantic

作者：Laura Feyrer, Joy E. Stanistreet, Céline Gomez, Matthew Philip Adams, Jack W. Lawson, Steven H. Ferguson, Susan G. Heaslip, Kyle J. Lefort, Eric A. Davidson, Nigel Edward Hussey, Hal Whitehead, Hilary Moors‐Murphy · 发表于：Aquatic Conservation Marine and Freshwater Ecosystems · 年份：2024 · DOI：10.1002/aqc.4064 · 被引用次数：18 · 研究领域：Marine animal studies overview、Underwater Acoustics Research、Marine and coastal plant biology

Abstract Understanding habitat requirements for species at risk is crucial for effective conservation management, even though the location and extent of vital habitats may be unknown for rare or elusive species. In the case of marine species, determining important habitat often relies on limited occurrence data or extrapolation from species distribution models (SDMs). SDMs predict habitat by associating species records with environmental variables, assuming a functional ecological relationship. This study focuses on northern bottlenose whales (NBW; Hyperoodon ampullatus ) and Sowerby's beaked whales (SBW; Mesoplodon bidens ) in the western North Atlantic. As both NBW and SBW are at risk in Canada, the objective was to identify the extent and function of important habitats to guide conservation efforts. The analysis mapped all available geographic occurrence data and used passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) data to inform the development of ensemble SDMs to predict potential habitat and assess the persistence of realized habitat use. Important habitats for NBW and SBW were found primarily concentrated along the continental shelf edges, at an average depth of 1200 m ± 460 SD. All habitat areas support foraging and movement and critical life history functions for both species. The Gully and other submarine canyons off eastern Nova Scotia emerged as important areas for both species, validating the existing Critical Habitat for NBW. However, spatial–temporal patterns diverged on eit...