Steller Sea Lion Research Paper

Do you know what the biggest animal ever to live on Earth is? You would be wrong if you speculated a dinosaur, elephant, or giraffe. You may be surprised to find out that the biggest animal ever to live on Earth is the Blue Whale and it is still alive today. The Blue Whale weighs as much as 33 elephants and consumes about 4 tons of food a day. I bet if you knew of an animal that was as long as 3 school buses you would want to keep this animal in the world forever. Although, the Blue Whale may not stay for long, many things affect the blue whale’s inhabitance, mainly the acts of humans have caused the Blue Whale’s to become endangered. Though, if you know the information about them you can help.

In 2008 the U.S Army Corps of Engineers observed 17 Steller Sea Lions eat 606 White Sturgeon below the Bonneville Dam. Which counted for 98 percent of the predation documented by sea Lions on Sturgeon that year. While California Sea Lions counted for 96 percent of the predation on Salmon and Steelhead that Year. As the facts shows the Steller Sea Lion is mainly the one preying on the White Sturgeon and the California Sea Lion is mainly preying on the

California Sea Lions are found off the west coast primarily in the Channel Islands off the California coast. Males can reach up to 850 pounds,

Most people would not appreciate a stranger walking into their home unannounced, taking their food, and making themselves at home. That is exactly what lionfish are doing along the Florida coastline. Lionfish are an invasive species that need to be contained. The reefs that they consistently invade off of the coast of the Florida are not the lionfish's natural habitat. This invasive species takes shelter and resources out of the reef that other species need to survive, and they destroy the environment around them. Humans have complicated the balance of the ecosystem by introducing lionfish, and now they need to help rectify the situation.

Bradshaw, C.J.A., Hindell, M.A, Best, N.J., Phillips, K.L., Wilson, G. and Nichols, PD. (2003). You are what you eat: describing the foraging ecology of southern elephant seals (Mirounga leonina) using blubber fatty acids. Proc. Roy. Soc. Lond. B. Biol. Sci. DOI 10.1098/rspb.2003.2371.

levels of chemicals which might have caused the decline of sea Otters. However, the lecture argues that Predation theory is

Bottlenose Dolphins are a very interesting animal. They have a fusiform (Spindle shaped) body that allows them to move quickly in the water. Because of the Dolphins’ shape they have bilateral symmetry. They also have a dorsal fin, flippers, and a fluke. However, Bottlenose Dolphins do not have ears on the outside of their bodies, hair, or hind limbs. The color of this type of dolphin is usually a light grey color to a black. Their stomach is white and sometimes has a pink hue. One physical adaptation these dolphins have is a telescoped skull. The skull is like this because it allows them to breathe more easily while swimming. Bottlenose Dolphins also have blubber that they use as insulation and vascular shunts that allow them to have cooling for certain types of organs and tissues in their bodies. Finally, Bottlenose Dolphins have sharp teeth that let them grasp onto their prey, so their tongue can push the prey down the dolphin’s throat. Bottlenose Dolphins have a range mass of 260 to 500kg which is 572.69 to 1101.32 in pounds. The average mass of the Bottlenose Dolphin is 400kg. Their average mass in pounds is 881.06.

Steller sea lions have few predators. Their main predators are killer whales, Great white sharks, Pacific sleeper sharks, and humans. Steller sea lions defend themselves by outswimming their predators. They can also sense when predators are nearby and their biggest defense is to get onto land. Their preys are the wide range of animals that they feed on. They track their behavior by diving deep as the prey moves deeper, and they gather in groups in locations that have seasonal runs of fish.

A venomous marine fish, known as the Lionfish, is native to tropical regions in the Indo-Pacific Ocean. In 1992 Hurricane Andrew tore through South Florida and was labeled the most destructive hurricane in the history of the United States. The category five storm is thought to have caused the accidental introduction of the species into FLorida. An aquarium was devastated by the winds, and released several Lionfish into Biscayne Bay. That, along with owners who became dissatisfied with the animals after realizing they’d eat other fish, and ignorantly set them free in the Atlantic, allowed the organisms to populate the waters very quickly.

Orcinus Orca, or more commonly known as the Killer Whale, is found in waters worldwide ranging from the Antarctic to tropical regions. Killer Whales are considered to be apex predators of the ocean and have no natural predators. Killer Whales have been observed consuming a large diversity of different marine animals such as fish and squid (Coscarella et al., 2015) and also prey on Subantarctic Fur Seals, which is what they are more commonly known to feed on (Pistorius et al., 2012). Pitman and Durban (2010) also made observations of Killer Whales hunting penguins in the Antarctic. Trying to understand how this top predator regulates the food web involves knowing the relationships among species and also their population size and diet (Coscarella et al., 2015). Killer Whales use different hunting techniques while trying to catch their food and are also very social creatures and tend to hunt in pods. Some Killer Whales have been observed simply chasing their prey until they tire or using a more advanced hunting tactic such as diving to deep depths to get their food, also another unusual activity observed are Killer Whales playing with their food.

The seal lion population has decreased by eighty-percent. The weird thing is that there is no bodies to prove that the seal lions are gone. Some of the causes of the decrease could be fisherman, pollution, and killer whales. The sea lions could also be starving to death. The fisherman are taking all of their sources of food. But, in Alaska the sea lions are thriving and the whales are not. Thirty years ago ninety percent of the whale population was gone in Alaska. This resulted in an abundance of more krill and plankton, which lead to more pollock and herring. The sea lions ate the herring the most as it was healthier and kept them full. But, when the herring population decreased the sea lions had to eat pollock. Pollock is the “junk food

The bottlenose dolphin, genus Tursiops, is a cetacean renowned for its social intelligence, even being prescribed the status of non-human persons along with other intelligent species such as great apes. Both dolphins and primates share a number of attributes that have led to an evolutionary propensity for intelligence, including prolonged parental care, long lives, complex social bonds, and communicative cooperation (Reynolds et al., 2000). But unlike primates, dolphins lack opposable thumbs, as well as any sort of limb that is able to manipulate their environment capably. Dolphins evolved in an environment that is less affected by gravity and provides three-dimensional movement, but provides limited chemosensory and visual cues for orientation

In the film we watched how scientists are trying to explain the mystery involves in the declining number of ocean lion. The scientists in Alaska are making some investigations; they already have set down some hypothesis for the disappearances of ocean lion. Their hypothesis state that the cause of the declining in number of the ocean lion can be caused by their food, the oil spill, or diseases. In this experiment, they are searching to identify the factors that are causing the premature dead of these young animals. They said because there is not body to study is hard to know what is happening to the ocean lions. For this reason, the scientists are taking some ocean lions from their natural habitat and are testing their DNA to identify any

The Impact Lionfish is quite dangerous because they damage marine aquatic ecosystems by decimating life on reefs. The way lionfish causes the damage is by eating small fish who keep the reefs healthy. Lionfishes can live a while without eating. While being 3 months or longer that they don’t really have to eat. Which can help them live while unlike the food they eat can’t survive that long without eating.

The sea lions currently populating the docks in Astoria Oregon may be causing serious depletion of fish as well as causing problems for the infrastructure of the docks they reside on. They are native to the California coastline but have made their way to the docks in Astoria which lies on the Columbia River. The reason this can be such a problem is because when you introduce an animal population that does not have any predators in their new habitat it can lead to overpopulation which leads to underpopulation of what they consume. In this case, the california sea lions are overpopulated and eating too many of the fish in that area of the Columbia River. The overpopulation of sea