The specialists conducted visual observations, studied the features of spatial distribution, assessed the age and sex structure of gray and bowhead whales in the Chukchi Sea, and Pacific walruses on the coast.
The weather conditions in late autumn 2024 allowed walruses to primarily use ice floes for placement, from which this ice-loving species of pinnipeds can conveniently dive and get food. They spent only three days at the coastal rookery: the rest of the time, walruses were only observed on ice haulouts and in the water.
The recorded number of Pacific walruses was slightly higher than 10 thousand individuals. In other years, up to 100 thousand walruses were recorded at this rookery.
In 2024, a high mortality rate of walruses was noted in the studied area, which is not typical for such a relatively small rookery.
An analysis of the available data helped to determine the cause of the phenomenon. In October, the rookery at Cape Serdtse-Kamen was occupied by walruses from the American group from Cape Point Lay, but their significant fatigue after a long journey through open water led to a high mortality rate of these animals on the coast.
As for the Russian group of walruses, it is known that during the autumn migration, it was always on the sea edge of the ice, and did not go to Cape Serdtse-Kamen then.
Another important area of research by Far Eastern scientists included monitoring the harvesting of marine mammals by representatives of the indigenous peoples of the North, Siberia and the Far East (IPN).
2 gray whales, 28 walruses, 1 bearded seal and 6 akibs (ringed seals) were examined, which were harvested by hunters of the territorial-neighboring community of the indigenous peoples of Chukotka "Daurkin" as part of their traditional economic activities. Due to the severe ice conditions in the Chukchi Sea, the harvesting by IPN representatives began only at the end of September, when the Chukchi Sea is at its lowest ice cover.
All the results obtained will be used to estimate the number of marine mammals in the Chukchi Sea.
Press service of VNIRO
