Charrassin, Sara Labrousse, Baptiste Picard, Christophe Guinet
Animals carrying biologging instruments provide longitudinal data on essential ocean variables, hydrography and animal behaviour. Simultaneously, they fill observing gaps in poorly observed regions and provide important information on ocean processes and even bathymetry. Oceanic physical and biological processes in the 21st century are influenced profoundly by anthropogenic stressors and there is an urgent need to understand how these physical changes affect animal performance. Central to this is being able to enumerate variation longitudinally which provides the power to forecast the responses of animals to predicted future environmental changes in the environment. We present our integrated bio-physical study in the Southern Ocean where we have been observing simultaneously ocean physics, bathymetry and seal biology (n=835) for 21 years. This long-term study has provided novel information on the SO including a revised bathymetry, improved knowledge of oceanographic processes and ocean warming, (70% of ocean profiles south of 60° S have been collected by seals) and an improved understanding of ocean features critical to seal foraging.