UPDATED: 2007-01-12

Northern elephant seals range from the Gulf of Alaska and the Aleutian islands south through California and into Baja California. Primarily they are oceanic animals, spending 90% of their lives in the ocean, living up to 5000 miles offshore and diving to depths in excess of 5000 feet in pursuit of deep water prey such as squid and bottom fish, spending only 4 to 5 minutes at the surface between foraging dives. They are one of nature's champion divers, exceeded perhaps only by the sperm whale; the maximum recorded depth is 5,015 feet by a male in 1991. Males, who have higher nutritional needs than females to sustain the several month fast they maintain during the breeding season, forage closer to shore along the continental shelf and have a more varied diet than the females to account for it. Females tend to forage beyond the edge of the continental shelf in deeper water. 

WEBSITE  EDITOR:
Krešimir J. Adamić