Low Abundance and Biodiversity of Top Predators -Seabirds and Marine Mammalsin High Arctic Seas

Abstract

Claude R. Joiris

This article concerns the comparison of data collected in different high Arctic seas by the same team, mainly same platform (from the bridge of icebreaking RV Poarstern), and thus the same methodology. Drastic differences were noted, from high numbers in the Bering Strait and Chukchi Sea on the one hand, and Fram Strait and Barents Sea on the other. In contrast, abundance, mainly of seabirds, was very low in the Arctic Basin. Most numerous bird species varied in different areas, mainly fulmar, kittiwake, Brünnich’s guillemot and locally ivory gull. Biodiversity was low, as reflected by low numbers of species, a few of them representing the vast majority in numbers of individuals: between 85% and 95% of the total. Cetaceans were close to absent from the High Arctic Ocean, the Wandel Sea off North Greenland and the shallow seas along the North-East Passage; pinnipeds and polar bear were tallied on the Outer Marginal Zone OMIZ, basically absent in the Closed Pack Ice Zone CPI.

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