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High pregnancy rates in humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) around the Western Antarctic Peninsula, evidence of a rapidly growing population
Antarctic humpback whales are recovering from near extirpation from commercial whaling. To understand the dynamics of this recovery and establish a baseline to monitor impacts of a rapidly changing environment, we investigated sex ratios and pregnancy rates of females within the Western Antarctic Pe...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
The Royal Society Publishing
2018
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5990787/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29892441 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsos.180017 |
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author | Pallin, Logan J. Baker, C. Scott Steel, Debbie Kellar, Nicholas M. Robbins, Jooke Johnston, David W. Nowacek, Doug P. Read, Andrew J. Friedlaender, Ari S. |
author_facet | Pallin, Logan J. Baker, C. Scott Steel, Debbie Kellar, Nicholas M. Robbins, Jooke Johnston, David W. Nowacek, Doug P. Read, Andrew J. Friedlaender, Ari S. |
author_sort | Pallin, Logan J. |
collection | PubMed |
description | Antarctic humpback whales are recovering from near extirpation from commercial whaling. To understand the dynamics of this recovery and establish a baseline to monitor impacts of a rapidly changing environment, we investigated sex ratios and pregnancy rates of females within the Western Antarctic Peninsula (WAP) feeding population. DNA profiling of 577 tissue samples (2010–2016) identified 239 males and 268 females. Blubber progesterone levels indicated 63.5% of the females biopsied were pregnant. This proportion varied significantly across years, from 36% in 2010 to 86% in 2014. A comparison of samples collected in summer versus fall showed significant increases in the proportion of females present (50% to 59%) and pregnant (59% to 72%), consistent with demographic variation in migratory timing. We also found evidence of annual reproduction among females; 54.5% of females accompanied by a calf were pregnant. These high pregnancy rates are consistent with a population recovering from past exploitation, but appear inconsistent with recent estimates of WAP humpback population growth. Thus, our results will help to better understand population growth potential and set a current baseline from which to determine the impact of climate change and variability on fecundity and reproductive rates. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-5990787 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2018 |
publisher | The Royal Society Publishing |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-59907872018-06-11 High pregnancy rates in humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) around the Western Antarctic Peninsula, evidence of a rapidly growing population Pallin, Logan J. Baker, C. Scott Steel, Debbie Kellar, Nicholas M. Robbins, Jooke Johnston, David W. Nowacek, Doug P. Read, Andrew J. Friedlaender, Ari S. R Soc Open Sci Biology (Whole Organism) Antarctic humpback whales are recovering from near extirpation from commercial whaling. To understand the dynamics of this recovery and establish a baseline to monitor impacts of a rapidly changing environment, we investigated sex ratios and pregnancy rates of females within the Western Antarctic Peninsula (WAP) feeding population. DNA profiling of 577 tissue samples (2010–2016) identified 239 males and 268 females. Blubber progesterone levels indicated 63.5% of the females biopsied were pregnant. This proportion varied significantly across years, from 36% in 2010 to 86% in 2014. A comparison of samples collected in summer versus fall showed significant increases in the proportion of females present (50% to 59%) and pregnant (59% to 72%), consistent with demographic variation in migratory timing. We also found evidence of annual reproduction among females; 54.5% of females accompanied by a calf were pregnant. These high pregnancy rates are consistent with a population recovering from past exploitation, but appear inconsistent with recent estimates of WAP humpback population growth. Thus, our results will help to better understand population growth potential and set a current baseline from which to determine the impact of climate change and variability on fecundity and reproductive rates. The Royal Society Publishing 2018-05-02 /pmc/articles/PMC5990787/ /pubmed/29892441 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsos.180017 Text en © 2018 The Authors. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Published by the Royal Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/, which permits unrestricted use, provided the original author and source are credited. |
spellingShingle | Biology (Whole Organism) Pallin, Logan J. Baker, C. Scott Steel, Debbie Kellar, Nicholas M. Robbins, Jooke Johnston, David W. Nowacek, Doug P. Read, Andrew J. Friedlaender, Ari S. High pregnancy rates in humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) around the Western Antarctic Peninsula, evidence of a rapidly growing population |
title | High pregnancy rates in humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) around the Western Antarctic Peninsula, evidence of a rapidly growing population |
title_full | High pregnancy rates in humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) around the Western Antarctic Peninsula, evidence of a rapidly growing population |
title_fullStr | High pregnancy rates in humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) around the Western Antarctic Peninsula, evidence of a rapidly growing population |
title_full_unstemmed | High pregnancy rates in humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) around the Western Antarctic Peninsula, evidence of a rapidly growing population |
title_short | High pregnancy rates in humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) around the Western Antarctic Peninsula, evidence of a rapidly growing population |
title_sort | high pregnancy rates in humpback whales (megaptera novaeangliae) around the western antarctic peninsula, evidence of a rapidly growing population |
topic | Biology (Whole Organism) |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5990787/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29892441 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsos.180017 |
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