Weddell Seal Science

Giving Thanks To Those Who Make Our Work Possible

From the Ice by Victor Villalobos, field research team:

Before returning to the ice, I wondered how our 2021 season would play out without a full crew and field camp at Big Razorback. My last field season was 2019 (pre-pandemic). Since then, I have missed the seal pups dearly, my old, trusty snowmobile “Crusty”, and the satisfying feeling of putting on stiff and salty Carhartt bibs every morning. I was also curious to see how McMurdo Station has changed given that the pandemic has made travel logistics more dynamic than the sea ice.

The author Victor Villalobos and his trusty snowmobile "Crusty" at the Turkshead Weddell seal pupping colony.

Every season has its challenges, but not every season is the same. The sea ice is a constant reminder that magnificence, beauty, and some risk are ever present with each step we take. However, the amazing McMurdo Field and Safety Team does an incredible job each year training B-009 [the science group number of the project] for some of the obstacles we may encounter out on the ice. About every two weeks, sea ice reports are published that provide detailed information that help us make field decisions throughout the season. Our jobs would not be possible without the diligent, hard work of all Field and Safety personnel and helicopter pilots.

The 2021 B-009 Field Research Team assisted by the McMurdo Field Safety & Training Team
as they hike in to access a Weddell seal pupping colony.

Comparable to the dynamics of the sea ice, I am continually impressed with the group of individuals that make this station operate under stressful forces. Although we all are working through a challenging pandemic, the ability to overcome formidable obstacles remains a puzzle for the people of McMurdo to solve every day. Many things have changed since I was last here, however, the quality and high standard of personnel remains at a pinnacle from what I remember.

The 2021 Weddell seal field research team enjoying McMurdo's wonderful Thanksgiving festivities.
From L to R: Evan Shields, Parker Levinson, and Victor Villalobos.

Although we do not have a field camp this year, I feel fortunate to be at McMurdo station. The spoils of having a hot meal, access to exercise, a warm room, and hot showers makes me forget that I am on the Antarctica continent. Sometimes overlooked, the hardworking staff in the galley provides us the energy to endure long days in sub-zero temperatures on the ice. Their amazing food, desserts, and tasty breads brightens our long days, especially when we must eat on the run. They always go above and beyond during the Holidays to make McMurdo feel like home for us. The logistics that go into providing hot water, hot meals, a warm room, as well as the janitors that keep things immaculately clean, are far too many to describe in detail here, but I appreciate every single McMurdo staff member and all that they do!

As I write this blog post we are in the middle of an Antarctic winter storm with strong winds rolling in. I have no doubt we will endure this storm because of the fortitude, discipline, and grit that every McMurdo member has. No matter the obstacle, the people of McMurdo find a way to overcome and make do with less. While B-009 is always grateful to work in Antarctica, I remind myself that we are especially fortunate to conduct Antarctic science amidst a global pandemic and many others do not have that same opportunity. I speak for all B-009 members that it is a pleasure to work with such a stellar community.

• Victor Villalobos
  Montana State University, Master’s of Science Candidate

Victor is a new Montana State University Master's of Science candidate on the project and is really valuable as he worked on the project in 2 different years: one when we had a camp at Big Razorback and one when we were based out of Turtle Rock. Victor has always been a great team member, very helpful with all aspects of camp life and field work, and very knowledgeable about our field gear, study area, and our tagging and survey procedures.

Interactive Weddell Seal Mom/Pup Image Sliders!

The Weddell seal population study is excited to announce a new outreach project: Interactive Image Sliders! The concept was developed by project multimedia specialist Jeremy Schmidt, (with a tip o' the hat to the the Katmai National Park grizzly bear project). The photos for these sliders were taken by researcher Jesse DeVoe. Because the mass (weight) of Weddell seal moms and pups changes so dramatically during the approximately 35 day nursing period, Image Sliders are a great way to see those changes. Here is a short video by the project's lead scientist, Dr. Jay Rotella, about mom/pup mass transfer using the new image sliders:

Following are the three image sliders used in the video above. The identities of the Weddell moms and pups are indicated in the black banners at the tops of the images, along with the month and day the photo was taken. The sliders can be moved back and forth using a finger on mobile devices, and cursor on computers.

We look very much forward to creating more Image Sliders on a variety of Weddell seal study subjects going forward. We hope you enjoy this new Weddell Seal Science imaging project!

- Mary Lynn Price

Pupping Season Now Winding Down

Season Update From Field Team Leader Parker Levinson:


Pupping is winding down, and we are making great progress tagging every pup in our study area. This is one of our big goals each season in order to know how big the birth cohort is and the age of seals when they return to the study area later in life. Over half the births happen within 9.5 days, peaking at the end of October, so pupping is a very busy time during our season. A large portion of births occur in pupping colonies that tend to be near land or islands where consistent cracks in the sea ice form each year.There are anywhere from 8-14 pupping colonies that occur in our study area depending on the year. Some of the seal colonies are small, like Inaccessible Island with less than 25 seals, but others, like Hutton Cliffs, can have many hundreds of seals.

Aerial view of Weddell seal colony at Hutton Cliffs. Photo by Parker Levinson.

A really crucial piece of data we collect for each pup is who their mom is, allowing us to look at maternal traits that may affect pup survival and to form complete reproductive histories for each female (like the 31 and 32 year old females we found this year). While moms and pups stick together throughout the 35-day nursing period, it is easiest to definitively know the mother the younger the pup is because there is less swimming and separation at early ages. We also like to know the birthdates of pups, which is another aspect of environmental variation we’ve looked at. And knowing birthdates allows us to weigh pups at specific points throughout their development to look at mass transfer between mom and pup.

Two large pups hanging out together. Photo by Parker Levinson.

With these objectives in mind, we try to visit the major colonies every other day. Sometimes bad weather prohibits us from accomplishing this, but for the most part, we’ve had success even with a smaller crew size this year. 

While pupping season is super fun, the tail end of it is one of my favorite times in the season because there are so many different sized pups in the colony. There are still a couple new pups being born so we get to witness small newborns. At the same time, we have pups that are more than 20 days old and over 200 lbs now. Seeing the discrepancy between different aged pups is quite fun! We are looking forward to watching the pups grow up, learn to swim, and continue napping. 

- Parker Levinson

Oldest Weddell Mom Ever Just Found By Field Team!

The oldest Weddell mom ever recorded has been discovered by our Antarctic field team of Parker Levinson, Evan Shields, and Victor Villalobos. This record setting SuperMom is 32 years old and with her 19th pup. Field team leader Parker Levinson reports that this mom was found at the nearshore pupping colony, Hutton Cliffs.

The previous longevity record was set this season by a 31 year old mom found by the field research team, and tied the study record set in 2014. The long-term Weddell seal database that has been developed by the Weddell seal population study over the more than half a century that the project has been tracking Weddells seals in the Erebus Bay study area is what has made it possible to determine these seal mom's ages and the number of pups born to each mom over her lifetime.

It is also interesting to note that all three of these thirty-something year olds, the new 32 year old mom and the two previous record holding 31 year olds, were found at or near the Hutton Cliffs pupping colony. This is a nearshore colony where many of the prime age Weddell moms tend to haul out to give birth on top of the sea ice.

In a future post we hope to explore more about the significant locations of these thirty-something Weddell SuperMoms--where each was born in the study area, and where they gave birth to their numerous pups. And it will be very interesting to learn how many of this new record holder's pups survived and went on to have pups of their own, and whether those pups have had pups!

- Mary Lynn Price

About Those Weddell Seal Males...

An 11 year old male Weddell seal on the sea ice at the nearshore Hutton Cliffs pupping colony.
Photo by Parker Levinson.

Two recent scientific papers by the project published this year and last, provide some new fascinating insight into the lives of male Weddell seals. A great recent article about the findings of these papers can be found in The Antarctic Sun. Yet the study of male Weddell seals is not new to the Weddell seal population project.

Although much of the Weddell seal population study's work has been on Weddell moms and pups over the more than 50 years of the project's existence, Weddell males were initially studied in the late 1960s by scientists Don Siniff, Ian Stirling, and others. (Please read more on the project's history here.) In the 1970s when the project was based at the University of Minnesota and headed by Don Siniff (Co-PI of the current Weddell seal population study now based at Montana State University), the research then focused on male Weddell underwater behavior and territorial defense. In fact, the only currently known underwater film of Weddell seal mating was obtained during this time!

1969 photo of  TV camera with 360 degree rotor used to film only known footage of Weddell seals mating underwater.
Photo courtesy of the archives of Dr. Don Siniff.

In 1973 it was determined that studying various aspects of Weddell seal behavior would benefit substantially by following the same seals over multiple years, and soon after the seasonal tagging of all of the seals in the study area was initiated and continues to this day. Currently, the field researchers identify and record all of the Weddell seal pups born in the Erebus Bay study area each pupping season, male and female. The researchers also make several surveys during the season to determine how many seals are in the entire Erebus Bay study area during that pupping season, and who they are.

Beginning in the late 1990s, male and female genetic samples were also obtained annually by the field research team, and are used for Weddell genetic studies by Dr. Tom Gelatte and others. A very recent paper that our research group helped with has evaluated methods for pedigree construction using genomics methods and samples collected from our study population and a nearby genetically isolated population of Weddell Seals (Miller et al. 2021). These genetic studies help researchers understand how individual Weddell males contribute to the composition of this Weddell population.

Another male Weddell seal, also at Hutton Cliffs pupping colony. Photo by Parker Levinson.

Two scientific papers that our research group recently published about male Weddell seals give interesting insight into the lives and contributions of male Weddells (Brusa et al. 2020, Brusa et al. 2021). The first of those papers provides evidence that like females, male Weddells also suffer declines in their probabilities of surviving from one year to the next as they age. Further, it appears that males don’t typically live as long as females do. Such a pattern suggests that males also likely incur reproductive costs that reduce their survival. Male-male contests and male territorial defense behavior likely take a toll on Weddell males as soon as they become reproductively active, and this continues throughout their lives. The second of the papers investigated where males of different ages tend to show up in different locations in our study area relative to where large groups of mother-pup pairs tend to be found. Weddell males that were at prime breeding ages tend to show up in more crowded nearshore colonies where there are more high-quality prime-age reproductive females. Younger males and very old males tend to be found more often in less-crowded offshore pupping colonies where there are fewer large, high-quality females of prime pupping age.

The great benefit of this long-term Weddell seal research project is that we now have reproductive and genetic data on numerous generations of Weddell seals, male and female. So we are now better able to understand how individual seals of both genders survive, live, reproduce, and contribute to the dynamics and stability of the overall general population of Weddell seals in Erebus Bay. This in turn can help us better understand the possible effects of climate change and environmental changes on Weddell seals, and possibly other species of long-lived marine mammals.

- Mary Lynn Price

Rare Older Weddell Mom and Her Pup Recorded By Field Team!

Report From Lead Project Scientist Dr. Jay Rotella:

Parker Levinson wrote and shared photos very recently of an older Weddell seal mom and her new daughter. Several of this mother’s features highlight some interesting aspects of the project. 

The mom, who is wearing tags 8281A, is 31 years old and with her 19th pup. She was born in 1990. She was not seen in the study area when she was 1, 2, or 4 years old (which is very typical). She has been seen in the study area in every other year of her life including this year when she produced a daughter. This highlights one of the reasons we are able to learn so much from these animals. They are highly faithful to the site of their birth, and the work that our teams put in each season allows us to know when they produce pups or not. 

This mom ties the current record for the oldest animal we’ve documented to date. We have only observed one other female that has lived to be 31 years of age and she too produced a pup at that age. 

First Rare Old Mom Described In 2014.

This year’s 31-year-old is one of the most productive females in the project’s history: she has produced 6 daughters and 13 sons (the record is 22 pups by the 1st older mom). The current older mom had her 1st pup at age 8-years-old, which is very typical, and has only skipped pupping 5 times: in 2004 when she was 14, the mega-icebergs were in place, and pup production dropped to an all-time low (but she was present); in 2010 (20 yrs old); 2013 (23 yrs old); 2018 (28 yrs old); and 2019 (29 yrs old). This highlights just how many years it takes to learn about lifetime outcomes for these animals.

When thinking about our current project and its goals of learning about how maternal features might influence pup survival and recruitment prospects, it’s easy to see just how long things take. For example, it will be several years before we know if her daughter from 2021 survives or not; if she does survive, she likely would start producing her own pups in 2028 or 2029. If she survives as long as her mother has, she might still be in the study area in 2050 or beyond.

Another feature that stands out is the fact that 59 different people have entered records on this female between when she was born and today. This emphasizes how many people have been involved in the project over the decades, gained experience and training, and helped out in so many critical ways. The list includes nearly every MSU grad student that’s worked on the project: Gillian Hadley, Darren Ireland, Kelly Proffitt, Jen Mannas, Glenn Stauffer, Thierry Chambert, Terrill Paterson, Kaitlin Macdonald, Shane Petch, and now Parker Levinson and Victor Villalobos. Mike Cameron who was Don Siniff’s last Ph.D. student on the project and did so much to organize and digitize the database and implement the use of handheld field computers, also is one of the people who entered data on this female. In addition many field technicians and each of the Principal and co-Principal Investigators from 1990 to present (Don Siniff, Ward Testa, Bob Garrott, and myself).

We're looking forward to following the progress of this new older Weddell mom.

- Jay Rotella

First Time on Station and on the Ice!

Field Update by Evan Shields, Field Research Technician:

From the outset, it was difficult to imagine how life in Antarctica and at McMurdo Station might look. I didn't really try to figure it out beforehand myself, instead opting to just see when I got here. Maybe that's a good thing. I'm not sure it would have been an easy thing for someone to convey through a picture or email, or even a conversation. It seems to me that most everything in Antarctica is one of a kind.

McMurdo Station with Scott Hut in the foreground. Photo by Evan Shields.

One of the first things I noticed, even before reaching McMurdo, was the sense of community. There appear to be longtime friendships borne of shared experiences, and I think the community is something that keeps drawing people back. Once on station, I found little signs everywhere left by people that care about their work and about this place. Everything has been given a nickname: buildings, machinery, equipment, people--you name it. People take the time to decorate their dorm rooms, the hallways, the bulletin boards, and more. There are memes and pop-culture references--probably McMurdo-culture references too, though I'm not sure I can spot those yet--in everyday places. A troll made of scrap-metal (and a really well-made one at that) minds the "troll bridge" between the galley and the science building. The list goes on. It seems to me that all of these little personal touches add to the sense of community and make McMurdo Station that much more unique.

Big Razorback Island with active volcano Mt. Erebus  beyond.
Photo by Evan Shields.

That’s a word I can’t seem to escape: unique. Out on the sea ice, I’m again reminded that I’ve never been in a place quite like it. And I’ve worked in some cold, remote places. Still, I can’t help but be impressed by the landscape itself: meters-thick sea ice will eventually give way to open water; an active volcano looms over the study area; glaciers, icebergs, and islands dot the horizon; and charismatic Weddell seals laze out on the ice with their young pups. With views like these, I can’t help but pull out my camera throughout the day and, with numb fingers, take just as many pictures as I can. The history of Ross Island and its importance to the heroic age of Antarctic exploration is also fascinating to me, and certainly another incomparable aspect of the area. Although I’m just starting to scratch the surface, I would like to learn a lot more.

Team snowmobiles with Turks Head and Hutton Cliffs in the background.
Photo by Evan Shields.

As we were snowmobiling back into town after a day on the sea ice, we crossed paths with a Hägglunds tracked vehicle, and a helicopter returning to station flew overhead. In that moment it again hit me how extraordinary this whole experience is and how many different individuals are working to collectively move the USAP forward. I’m grateful to be a part of it.

- Evan Shields

Evan Shields just completed his M.S. degree on trumpeter swan research in Yellowstone National Park working on historical data for the species abundance and status in the Park over multiple decades. Dr. Jay Rotella served as Evan’s graduate advisor, and notes that Evan did a great job on his thesis. He also has lots of field experience working on a diversity of mammals (including mountain lions and deer) and birds. He has developed a lot of excellent data management and analysis skills, which will make him a doubly-valuable asset on our project. This is his first season in Antarctica.

Antarctica Field Work Begins, First Pup of the Season!

2021 Field Team Ready To Go! L-R: Parker Levinson, Evan Shields, and Victor Villalobos. Photo by Parker Levinson.

Field Report From Parker Levinson:

Field work has begun! Monday was our first day in the field, and we did what’s called a “shakedown”, which is basically a shorter day where we test out our gear in the elements. This includes making sure we have the right layering system for snowmobile rides, ensuring the proper equipment gets placed on the snowmobiles, and orienting ourselves with the geographic landmarks. It was a gorgeous, calm day, about 7 degrees Fahrenheit without a cloud in the sky, and we all thoroughly enjoyed being out in the field.

First Weddell seal pup recorded for the 2021 pupping season,
as mom looks on. Photo by Parker Levinson.

On Tuesday, we tagged our first pup of the 2021 season! He was born at Big Razorback island to an 8 year old mom. It’s still a little early for pups, so he was our only pup for the day, but it was really nice to see our first pup. The carpenters also brought out and secured our emergency shelter and fuel cache to Big Razorback. The shelter is a hard-sided, red dome known as an apple. Because we won’t have a camp in the field this year, we’ll have an apple in two different locations so that we have a place to get out of the elements and warm up if necessary.

One of the team's two hard-shelled "Apples" which serve as a warming
station and shelter if needed in the field. Photo by Parker Levinson.

Today was another productive day in the field! We made substantial progress on our road system. These flagged routes are in place to keep us safe in case weather conditions change while we are in the field and we have to navigate back to our emergency shelters or to McMurdo station. In order to make roads, we drill into the sea ice to place a bamboo flag as a marker. We put these flags at 50 meter intervals and continue in a straight line to wherever our destination may be. Occasionally, we’ll have to cross a sea ice crack, which we first profile by measuring the width and ice thickness to ensure it is crossable.

Using a hand drill to profile a sea ice crack as part of flagging safe routes about the study area sea ice. Photo by Parker Levinson.

Each of us goes through a full day of training on how to safely work on the sea ice where we learn how to profile these cracks. In terms of seals, there was one more pup today. This male was born to an untagged mother. We tagged the mother today, so although we don’t know her age, we’ll have a record of any pups she has in future seasons.

The season is off to a great start so far, and we can’t wait to share it with you!

• Parker Levinson (she/her)

Parker Levinson is a new M.S. student on the project and will be our crew leader. She was a great research technician on our project last season. She also worked on penguins at Cape Royds the past 2 years. Over the summer, she spent a great deal of time preparing to be our crew leader; Kaitlin Macdonald, our very experienced Ph.D. student and multi-time project participant and crew leader, has been a great help with Parker’s preparations and will be standing by to provide advice as needed. We are really fortunate to have Parker on our team and as our crew leader. 

Traveling to Antarctica in the Middle of a Global Pandemic

Special Report From Antarctica Field Team Leader, Parker Levinson:

Exciting news, after 23 days in managed isolation, we have made it to Antarctica!

Field Team Member Evan Shields walks off the Boeing 757
and takes his first steps in Antarctica. Photo by Parker Levinson.

While it’s always a challenge getting to Antarctica, COVID-19 has made it much more difficult. Monumental precautions are being taken to ensure that COVID-19 doesn’t reach Antarctica. As such, each person traveling from the United States to McMurdo Station must complete a rigorous isolation process. We first all flew to San Francisco where we got tested for COVID-19 and remained isolated in our individual hotel rooms for five days until our charter flight to Christchurch, New Zealand. In NZ, we entered managed isolation and quarantine (MIQ) facilities run by the government. MIQ basically just means we are required to stay isolated in our individual hotel rooms for 14 days. Anytime you open your door or go outside, you must wear a mask. We get meals delivered outside our rooms three times a day and have frequent COVID-19 tests.

The folks coordinating MIQ made sure we had enjoyable and productive stays. We completed many trainings for the season like proper Antarctic waste disposal and Antarctic Field Safety. We had the chance to get outside for some daily fresh air and some socially-distanced, masked walking with other folks going down to the Ice. We’ve found creative ways of remaining active in our hotel rooms. (Did you know that pushing your bed on a roller frame is a great cardio workout?) There were even virtual science lectures about the science being conducted this season. Here’s how we stayed busy over the past couple weeks:

Victor Villalobos: I spent some of my time reading [science] papers, catching up on rest (while we have it), learning some R*, and going over the study area map and various ice/crack/pup tagging scenarios. On a positive note, I also got some outdoor time, exercise (in my room), and I developed a paper bag bowling game in my spare, spare, time. Since we got food deliveries three times a day, these paper bags can really add up. 

Paper Bag Bowling During Managed Isolation and Quarantine.
Concept, Design and Video by Victor Villalobos.

Evan Shields: I spent pretty much all of my time in MIQ relaxing in one way or another. After finishing up with graduate school just a few short weeks prior to flying into San Francisco, I was ready to decompress and catch up on some relaxation. I made a lot of video and phone calls to family and friends, watched a handful of TV shows and movies, and tried to spend 45 minutes to an hour each day outside. I also spent quite a bit of time reading and finished a couple of science-fiction classics I had been wanting to read for quite some time. I was pleasantly surprised at how good the food has been and, although I actually enjoy cooking when I'm at home, I thoroughly enjoyed having meals delivered to my door.

Evan's First Seal: On the way to the McMurdo Station ice airfield,
Evan takes a photo of his first Weddell Seal. Photo by Parker Levinson.

Parker Levinson: I spent much of MIQ catching up on sleeping, striving to get 8.5 hours a night with the frequent afternoon nap. I also caught up on some academic literature and took a couple R coding courses*. I tried to get 10,000 steps a day, which was facilitated by only talking on the phone with friends and family if I was also pacing my room. 

After completing MIQ, we moved to a different hotel where we remained masked and socially distanced until our flight to McMurdo. There were a couple of weather delays, but the day before yesterday we arrived at McMurdo Station on a Boeing 757, which allowed for some stunning views of the continent. As nice as it was to have unlimited relaxation and reading time, we’re very much looking forward to starting our field season.

The team outside Building 155 (the main building on McMurdo Station)
after completing their GPS training. Masks and social distance are
currently required on station. Photo by Parker Levinson.

We are so very appreciative of everything that is being done to keep us happy and healthy this season. We are aware of the monumental effort being made by the individuals from the U.S. Antarctic Program, New Zealand Defense Force, and hotels in order to get us down to Antarctica as safely and comfortably as possible. To that end, we want to express our deepest gratitude to the New Zealand government and United States Antarctic Program for making this season possible.

• Parker Levinson (she/her)
  Montana State University, Graduate Student
  

___________________________________________________________________

* R is a software environment for statistical computing and graphics.

Research Goals for the 2021 Antarctica Field Season

Special Report From Lead Project Scientist, Dr. Jay Rotella:

We are fortunate to be able to field a research team this season. Because of logistics limitations and challenges, we will be able to have a team of 3 rather than 6 on the ice from mid-October until approximately mid-December. Also, the team will work from McMurdo Station rather than from a field camp out on the sea ice. Despite the challenges, our team will be able to make progress on the core objectives of our project.

In particular, the team will be able to maintain the long-term database, which is, of course, valuable in its own right and quite critical to our current project. Over the last decade, we have collected data on body mass and maternal features for a large sample of pups. Our current project is focused on determining which of those pups have (a) survived, (b) become mothers, (c) reproduced the most and (d) evaluating how those outcomes relate to features of the pup’s mother, her maternal investment in the pup, and the environmental conditions the pup has experienced.

Our team of 3 will be able to identify all mothers and associate all pups with their mothers. This will be very valuable for keeping the data on individual reproductive histories intact, and for identifying which of the pups we worked on in past years have become mothers (a core objective of our current grant).

The team will also conduct our surveys of the population and collect data that are crucial to knowing the population’s size and to gaining information on survival of males and females that were observed in previous years of the study. The team will conduct fewer surveys than is typical and conduct surveys over the course of 2-3 days rather than in a single day. The team also plans to survey the more remote colony of seals at White Island at least once, which we do every year with helicopter support, to maintain the database on White Island seals. We are really pleased to be able to continue the project, and look forward to what we can learn this year.

- Jay Rotella

About Those Amazing Weddell Seals...

For viewers new to this project, some quick Weddell seal info might be helpful. Weddell seals are true seals, and live their entire lives in Antarctica. They can be found all around the Antarctic continent. Weddell pups are born on top of the sea ice, where Weddell moms gather usually in colonies during the Austral Spring pupping season. This Montana State University Weddell seal population and mass dynamics study focuses on seals in the Erebus Bay area where there are numerous seasonal pupping colonies to which Weddell moms return year after year to give birth and mate. These seals are "philopatric," meaning that they usually return to the place where they were born to give birth to pups of their own. 

Weddell seals are excellent divers. They can hold their breath for up to an hour or more, and dive to around 2000 ft. Because they can hold their breath for so long, they are able to travel far under the sea ice to access the top on the sea ice to give birth where there are no natural predators that might prey on their vulnerable pups. They make use of tidal cracks and holes in the ice that occur where the sea ice meets the fast ice--ice that is fastened to the shorelines. Weddells use their big sharp teeth to rake the ice and widen cracks and holes to keep them open for breathing and access to the top of the sea ice to haul out. Weddell moms will also use their teeth to make ramps along the sides of holes and cracks that help their new pups get back out of the water as they learn to swim. More on these amazing animals to come!

- Mary Lynn Price

Birth Of An Antarctica Weddell Seal Pup

While we await word from the 2021 Antarctic field team currently undergoing managed isolated quarantine in Christchurch, New Zealand in preparation for heading to McMurdo Station, Antarctica, I thought I'd post this black & white video of a Weddell seal mom giving birth to her new pup. This video was shot during the 2011 Weddell seal pupping season when I deployed with the field team and was able to do a lot of filming.  I've been making videos about this project since 2008 when I first deployed to produce videos for the International Polar Year, and created short video portraits for the Women Working In Antarctica Project and interviewed then MS student Jen Mannas about the work of the Weddell seal project.

During the upcoming pupping season in Erebus Bay we will be posting updates from the field and articles about Weddell seals. We'll also be delving further into the importance of studying this population of Weddell seals and adding to a dataset that is now over 50 years old. You can check out more of our videos on our YouTube Channel and learn more about the Weddell population study on our outreach website.

- Mary Lynn Price

2021 Antarctica Weddell Seal Field Team Heads To The Ice!

A large sea ice crack in the Erebus Bay, Antarctica Weddell seal study area. 
This beautiful photo courtesy Natalie Brechtel of the United States Antarctica Program (USAP).

The 2021 field team is on its way to Antarctica! Dr. Jay Rotella, Principal Investigator and lead scientist on the project, says that "the current plan has the team members heading to San Francisco on September 11th, where they will undergo some covid testing and be housed while they await being cleared for a chartered flight to Christchurch, New Zealand. Once in Christchurch, the group is to be housed in a managed, isolated quarantine (MIQ) for 14 days before they fly to McMurdo Station, Antarctica. We really appreciate all that is being done in the background by so many to allow us to field a team. We also really appreciate all that each of our team members is doing to get to McMurdo safely so that they can continue our data collection despite the many challenges."

This season, as with last year, the field team will consist of only 3 people due to covid restraints. This is half the usual number needed to complete all the field work required during the season, which means the field team will have their hands full doing everything they are able to keep this dataset intact!

The 2021 Antarctica field team consists of the following people, per Jay Rotella:

1) Parker Levinson - Parker is a new M.S. student on the project and will be our crew leader. She was a great research technician on our project last season. She also worked on penguins at Cape Royds the past 2 years. Over the summer, she spent a great deal of time preparing to be our crew leader; Kaitlin Macdonald, our very experienced Ph.D. student and multi-time project participant and crew leader, has been a great help with Parker’s preparations and will be standing by to provide advice as needed. We are really fortunate to have Parker on our team and as our crew leader. She is ready and well prepared, and we really appreciate all she’s done to get ready.

2) Victor Villalobos - Victor is a new M.S. student on the project and will be really valuable as he worked on the project in 2 different years: one when we had a camp at Big Razorback and one when we were based out of Turtle Rock. Victor has always been a great team member, very helpful with all aspects of camp life and field work, and very knowledgeable about our field gear, study area, and our tagging and survey procedures. Because our crew last year was not able to travel by snowmobile to areas north of the Erebus Glacier Tongue and couldn’t work at Tent or Inaccessible Islands due to open water there, Parker didn’t get to experience our typical work in those outer areas of the study area. Victor’s experience in those areas as well as all other aspects of our field project will be valuable indeed! Victor also has a lot of great experience working on other large mammals in challenging environments, including multiple years of experience on grizzly bears in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. 

3) Evan Shields - Evan just completed his M.S. degree on trumpeter swan research in Yellowstone National Park working on historical data for the species abundance and status in the Park over multiple decades. Dr. Jay Rotella served as Evan’s graduate advisor, and notes that Evan did a great job on his thesis. He also has lots of field experience working on a diversity of mammals (including mountain lions and deer) and birds. He has developed a lot of excellent data management and analysis skills, which will make him a doubly-valuable asset on our project. This will be his first season in Antarctica.

We hope to get updates from the field team during the 14 day managed, isolated quarantine in Christchurch, and will post these updates as they arrive. Stay tuned for another very challenging and vital Weddell seal population and mass dynamics study field season!

- Mary Lynn Price
With info and team bios provided by Dr. Jay Rotella

A Gracious Bravo! To The 2020 Weddell Seal Field Team!

Special Report from 2020 Field Team Leader, Kaitlin MacDonald:

Our crew has now completed the 2020 field season and we are awaiting the arrival of a LC-130 cargo plane that will take us back to Christchurch and eventually our homes in the US.

This year was quite different from any of my previous for a number of reasons. Due to the pandemic reductions in personnel that were made across McMurdo station our crew was reduced to three people. This year we had unusual sea ice conditions with the ice edge basically ending at the Erebus Glacier Tongue. For our crew this meant no Big Razorback field camp and more importantly only helicopter access to the northside of our study area. During this unusual season we were able to get quite a bit done despite the challenges we faced.

If you’ve been following along this year you will know we set-up two emergency camps with tents, food and fuel in case we were stuck in poor weather on either side of our study area. On the North side of the study area this is where we would land and stage our snowmobiles. Our last few days on the sea ice were spent deconstructing these camps and getting the gear back to McMurdo.

One of our snowmobiles is rigged to be transported back to McMurdo

Our largest success this season was tagging pups in the study area. We were able to tag all pups that were safely accessible in our study area and make the association between pups and mothers for most pups that were tagged. We ended up tagging over 500 pups this year. This was an important task for our crew as it allows us to know whether a seal was born in the study area, provides us with ages of individuals, and allows us to record reproductive histories for adult females. 

Will and Parker prepare to tag a pup

This year we continued our mass dynamics work weighing a subset of mothers and pups. We also deployed temperature tags on the pups that we weighed. While we were able to get mid-lactation masses for nearly all pups enrolled, due to deteriorating sea ice conditions the sea ice was closed to travel, and we were unable to get weaning masses for the majority of pups.

A fully molted pup catches some zzz's at Hutton Cliffs

In addition to weighing pups and photographing mothers the latter half of our season was spent doing study area surveys and retagging individuals that were missing full tag sets. We were very happy to have the time to retag adults with less than full tag sets as this work will ensure that we continue to get individual data for these seals. Our study area wide surveys can be quite long days because we spend these days making sure we record the tag numbers of every seal that is accessible within the study area. With only three of us our study area wide surveys took a bit longer and the number completed was reduced from a normal year, but we were still able to get these valuable data. 

The 2020 crew at the end of our final survey (from left to right: Kaitlin, Parker, and Will).

Our crew had the great fortune to spot three of the iconic Antarctic species during our work on the sea ice. We spotted a number of Adélie penguins, a large group of emperor penguins, and a pair of snow petrels! 

Emperor penguins at North Base

While this year was one of the more unusual for B-009 we are grateful to have the opportunity to continue our long-term study this year. We are thankful to the contractors and support staff at McMurdo who worked so hard to make our field season a reality! We couldn’t have achieved as much as we did without the hard work of Parker and Will, who stepped up to the challenge as first year crew members making this season fun and successful!

- Kaitlin MacDonald

Unusual 2020 Weddell Seal Pupping Season Comes to an End

The sea ice of Erebus Bay, Antarctica near McMurdo Station is now closed to further sea ice travel due to large cracks developing in the sea ice. Fortunately the 2020 Weddell Seal Population and Mass Dynamics Study field team was able to retrieve vital seal recording and logging instruments, complete one last seal survey, and obtain weights on the last group of pups.

Photos, above, courtesy Natalie Brechtel and Ben Adkison of McMurdo Field Safety & Training, show changes in the crack in the sea ice near Turtle Rock one week apart.

We hope to post one last 2020 field update from the Weddell seal study field team soon, with further information on this season's Weddell population, and number of pups born.

- Mary Lynn Price

 

 

Wild 2020 Weddell Pupping Season Wrapping Up

Special from Kaitlin MacDonald, Field Team Leader:

Our field season has flown by and we have just a brief time left to finish out the season. Towards the end of October and early November our crew of three was busy tagging pups and enrolling mother-pup pairs in our mass study. More recently we have been weighing pups on the south side of the study area.  We spent the past few weeks getting 20-day weights of pups and taking photos of their mothers for mass estimates.

Photo of Our Field Team Courtesy Natalie Brechtel

We are just now working to get the third and final mass measurement of pups enrolled in our mass study. At 35-days old we weigh these pups to get an approximate weaning mass and remove the temperature tag that has been attached to the pup’s flipper since birth. These tags record the time and temperature and provide a record of when the pup was in the water.  There is incredible variation in the time pups first enter the water, 4 days old to 32 days old, and the amount of time pups spend in the water. Shane Petch who recently defended his master’s thesis did some interesting work with the amount of time pups spend in the water.

Mom and pup lounging in the sun at Hutton cliffs, photo by Parker Levinson

We also flew out to White Island to tag pups and do a survey of individuals at this small colony. One of the mothers we encountered at White Island was 29 years old. Since the oldest mother we have recorded is 31 years old it was quite exciting to see such an old mom at White Island and what looks to be her healthy pup.

- Kaitlin MacDonald

2020 Weddell Pupping Season Field Team Interview!

In this very unusual 2020 Weddell seal pupping season, the Antarctic Field Team took some time to do a cool brief interview at the Hutton Cliffs Weddell pupping colony. Hope you enjoy it!

This short video was produced on location by the 2020 Antarctica Field Team: crew leader Kaitlin MacDonald, and field team members Parker Levinson and Will McDonald. More information on the Weddell Seal Population and Mass Dynamics Project at WeddellSealScience.com.

- Mary Lynn Price

This Most Unusual Weddell Seal Pupping Season!

This has been probably the most unusual Weddell seal pupping season in the project's 51 year history. First, the lengthy quarantines the three person team went through to get to the Ice and keep Antarctica Covid-free. Then the closeness of the sea ice edge this season, which prevents vehicular travel north of the Erebus Glacier Tongue where numerous Weddell seal pupping colonies are located. (All photos by team member Will MacDonald.)

Notes lead project scientist Dr. Jay Rotella, "Our team is making the best of the season and collecting lots of useful data thanks to the great support from many people that work at McMurdo Station and from the National Science Foundation. Pups are being born at a rapid clip though that should start to slow down pretty dramatically in another week or so."

"For the next 6-7 weeks, the team will start to focus more of their time on population surveys. By mid-December, we’ll know a lot more about pup production and the size of the adult population size in this interesting year," reports Dr. Rotella.

-Mary Lynn Price

2020 Weddell Seal Pupping Season Underway!

Special from Crew Leader Kaitlin MacDonald

It has been a busy start to an interesting season. Our team of three has been working hard to prepare emergency caches on the sea ice and start tagging pups. 

Our emergency cache on the north side of the Erebus Glacier Tongue. Photo by Parker Levinson

The sea ice edge which currently runs from the Erebus Glacier Tongue up to Tent and Inaccessible islands prevents our team from driving to the north half of our study area. To access the north side of the study area we will be using helicopter support this year. Before we could start flagging routes and tagging pups in the northern and southern halves of our study area we had to set-up an emergency cache where we can hunker down if the weather deteriorates while we are working. We successfully set-up both our caches with the wonderful help of folks from McMurdo. These caches are well stocked and will be a cozy refuge should we ever need them.

We have also been hard at work getting caught up tagging the pups that were born before we were able to start day trips to the sea ice. Our team does their best to tag every pup at each colony every other day so that we can ensure the birthdate of a pup occurred during a 48-hour window.

Knowing a pup’s birthday within 48 hours of birth allows us to ask interesting questions such as whether pup birthdates are related to maternal age or mass loss of mothers during lactation. Tagging pups soon after they are born also allows us to more easily identify the mothers of pups as they are in very close contact during the first week or so after birth.

Weddell seals at Turtle Rock

It's difficult to say exactly how we are doing in terms of pup numbers compared to previous years because we have only been able to access two of the colonies at this point. I did compare numbers for Hutton and Turtle Rock from previous years and it looks like we are at a similar number of pups tagged by this point last year. Our next flight to the north side is Wednesday so hopefully we should get a better idea of actual pup numbers after that flight, although it might be later than that considering we will need to flag a route to the north side colonies on Wednesday.

- Kaitlin MacDonald

Antarctica Sea Ice Conditions Challenge the 2020 Field Team

The sea ice edge in Erebus Bay of the Ross Sea in Antarctica is much further south this season, running right up to the end of the Erebus Glacier Tongue, and cutting off vehicle access to the Weddell seal colonies beyond the Tongue in the Erebus Bay study area.

This means that access to many of the Weddell seal colonies in the study area will require travel by helicopter, since snowmobiles cannot safely cross the Erebus Glacier Tongue (EGT). In many recent previous seasons, the Weddell Seal Study field team would be based at a remote sea ice camp located at Big Razorback Island. However, this very unusual season there is no way to transport the sea ice camp huts beyond the EGT. Below is a photograph by Natalie Brechtel, the Sea Ice Point of Contact, of the south side of Big Razorback Island and the sea ice edge beyond:

Inaccessible Island is in the background. This season the sea ice presents uneven frozen terrain, and requires great care in traveling, especially in flat light. Our field team is very well-trained in sea ice safety and safe travel.

Below is an image from a previous season showing the location of many of the Weddell seal colonies, as well as the placement in many of the previous years of the remote sea ice camp of the Weddell seal study field team members.- Mary Lynn Price