Evaluating breeding habitat and populations of ringed seals Phoca hispida in Svalbard fjords

In Tempelfjorden and Sassenfjorden, Svalbard, 12 March to4 April 1990, a Siberian husky dog was used to detect ringed seal breathing holes in the ice, using random stratified sampling to sample 20% (40 km 2 ) of the total area. The area was estimated to contain 997 ringed seal breathing holes, corresponding to 293 ringed seals. A maximum of 185 pups were born in the area. A breeding condition factor was constructed to enable comparisons of yearly and areal variation in ice cover and precipitation within ringed seal breeding habitats.