Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand abstracts

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Increase in the abundance of New Zealand fur seals at the Catlins, South Island, New Zealand

Chris Lalas*, Brian Murphy ⁺

Distribution and abundance of New Zealand fur seals (Arctocephalus forsteri ) were assessed along the 100 km of the Catlins coastline (46deg. 23[[minute]] S, 169deg. 46[[minute]] E to 46deg. 40[[minute]] S, 168deg. 58[[minute]]E), south-eastern tip of South Island, New Zealand. Our surveys began in 1978 but were irregular and mainly qualitative until comprehensive counts were made in four consecutive summers from 1993/94 to 1996/97. The only rookeries (breeding colonies) were at Nugget Point (46deg. 27[[minute]]S, 169deg. 49[[minute]] E) where breeding began in 1979 or 1980. Four annual direct counts of live pups indicated that the annual exponential rate of increase in pup numbers averaged 19% with a total of 310 pups in 1996/97. Nugget Point accounted for 60% of the total of almost 2000 seals more than 1-year old counted along the Catlins coast during a survey in January 1994. Elsewhere, only three haul-outs (non-breeding colonies) held aggregations of at least 20 seals ashore per 100 m of shoreline in summer. We termed these locations "major haul-outs" and consider them to be probable sites for future rookeries because they satisfy the main environmental criteria favoured by breeders.

Keywords: Arctocephalus forsteri; New Zealand fur seal; population status; pup numbers; Nugget Point

(c) Journal of The Royal Society of New Zealand,

Volume 28, Number 2, June 1998, pp 287-294

PDF file of entire paper: medium quality (543K); (scanned from paper original: notes about this process)

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