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| Kirk Beckendorf - Blanco MIddle School (Blanco, TX) | |
| Research Experience: | Alaskan Coastal System - Environmental Variability, Bowhead Whale Distributions and Iñupiat Subsistence Whaling - Project Web Site |
| Research Objectives: | Bowhead whales are found on the shelf along northern Alaska during their fall migration and have been hunted there for centuries. The objective of this study is to investigate the cascading impacts of climate variability on oceanography, plankton distributions, bowhead whale migrations, and Iñupiat subsistence whaling. Research is designed to describe why bowhead whales stop at Barrow during their migration, to characterize the oceanographic conditions that make this a good place for food, to evaluate how climate variability impacts the locations of good feeding spots and the weather and ice conditions, and to understand the resilience of the subsistence hunting tradition to these changes. The research consists of biological and physical ocean modeling, oceanographic field sampling, and retrospective analysis. |
| Research funded by: | National Science Foundation (Office of Polar Programs) |
| Host Researchers: | Carin Ashjian - Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and Bob Campbell - URI Graduate School of Oceanography |
| Return to "Research Experiences" | |
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ARMADA Project Office of Marine Programs Graduate School of Oceanography University of Rhode Island armada@gso.uri.edu |