Abstract: The ability to recognize individual animals has substantially increased our knowledge of the biology and behaviour of many taxa1 . However, not all species lend themselves to this approach, either because of insufficient phenotypic variation or because tag attachment is not feasible. The use of genetic markers (‘tags’) represents a viable alternative to traditional methods of individual recognition, as...
Abstract: Concentrations and patterns of chlorinated biphenyls (CBS) and other persistent organochlorine compounds (OCs) were determined from small blubber biopsy samples collected from northwestern Atlantic minke (Balaenoptera acurostrata) , fin (Balaenoptera physalus), blue (Balaenoptera musculus) , and humpback (Megaptera novaeangliae) whales summering in the Gurf of St. Lawrence, Quebec. Concentrations of CPCB (sum of 19 congeners) in biopsy samples ranged...
Abstract: Techniques for collecting small biopsies from the outer strata of the blubber of live whales have been used to monitor chemical contaminant concentrations in cetaceans. In order to validate this monitoring technique, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and other organochlorine (OCs) compounds were analysed in blubber mantle samples collected from different body sites on the carcasses of three minke whales (Balaenoptera...
Abstract: Mitochondrial DNA haplotypes of humpback whales show strong segregation between oceanic populations and between feeding grounds within oceans, but this highly structured pattern does not exclude the possibility of extensive nuclear gene flow. Here we present allele frequency data for four microsatellite loci typed across samples from four major oceanic regions: the North Atlantic (two mitochondrially distinct populations), the...
