Killer whale range expansion and extended seasonal presence in the eastern Canadian Arctic, 2002-2023
PURPOSE:
The focus of this research is on changes in the distribution of killer whales in the Canadian Arctic, which is within the field of marine biogeography and marine megafauna. Our research details change in killer whale presence and ties it to changes in sea ice coverage. These are novel results, presenting trends in the arrival and departure dates of killer whales into the eastern Canadian Arctic for the first time. We go on to discuss the impacts of these changes on other aspects of Arctic ecosystems and how increasing in killer whale presence might affect other species and the management of those species in Canada. Killer whales are a widespread species of interest, especially in the Canadian Arctic as their presence is tied to multiple aspects of a region rapidly changing from the effects of climate change.
DESCRIPTION:
This study examines 20 years of killer whale (Orcinus orca) sightings in the eastern Canadian Arctic, drawing from a comprehensive sighting database spanning 1850-2023. Despite inherent biases favoring data collection near communities and coastal areas, spatiotemporal analyses reveal significant shifts in killer whale distribution linked to changing sea ice conditions. We developed a clustering metric representing the mean distance to the five nearest sightings and results show that killer whales are progressively moving away from historically high-use areas and that sighting locations are becoming more dispersed over time. A significant year × sea ice interaction indicates observations occur earlier during their arrival period at lower sea ice concentrations over time, suggesting that declining sea ice
concentration contributes to earlier arrival. Conversely, for departure periods, killer whales are observed farther south later in the year, likely linked to earlier freeze-up at higher latitudes, and are overall observed later into the year over time. This trend has led to a near doubling of their average presence from 26 days in 2002 to 48 days in 2023 (27 July to 13 September) reflecting an extended open-water season. These findings underscore the prolonged seasonal use of Arctic regions by killer whales, driven by diminishing sea ice and expanding openwater habitat. Such shifts highlight potential implications for Arctic marine ecosystems as killer whales increasingly overlap with endemic species.
Simple
- Date ( RI_366 )
- 2002
- Date ( RI_367 )
- 2025-05-15
- Purpose
- The focus of this research is on changes in the distribution of killer whales in the Canadian Arctic, which is within the field of marine biogeography and marine megafauna. Our research details change in killer whale presence and ties it to changes in sea ice coverage. These are novel results, presenting trends in the arrival and departure dates of killer whales into the eastern Canadian Arctic for the first time. We go on to discuss the impacts of these changes on other aspects of Arctic ecosystems and how increasing in killer whale presence might affect other species and the management of those species in Canada. Killer whales are a widespread species of interest, especially in the Canadian Arctic as their presence is tied to multiple aspects of a region rapidly changing from the effects of climate change.
- Status
- completed; complété RI_593
- Maintenance and update frequency
- notPlanned; nonPlanifié RI_542
- DFO Areas Zones du MPO ( RI_525 )
-
- Baffin Bay
- Davis Strait
- Hudson Bay and James Bay
- Government of Canada Core Subject Thesaurus Thésaurus des sujets de base du gouvernement du Canada ( RI_528 )
-
- Oceans
- Whales
- Use limitation
- Open Government Licence - Canada (http://open.canada.ca/en/open-government-licence-canada)
- Access constraints
- license; licence RI_606
- Use constraints
- license; licence RI_606
- Use limitation
- None
- Classification
- unclassified; nonClassifié RI_484
- Spatial representation type
- textTable; texteTable RI_637
- Metadata language
- eng; CAN
- Character set
- utf8; utf8 RI_458
- Topic category
-
- Biota
- Oceans
- Begin date
- 2002
- End date
- 2023
- Description
- Eastern Canadian Arctic
))
- Reference system identifier
- http://www.epsg-registry.org / EPSG:4326
- Distribution format
-
-
CSV
(
n/a
)
-
PDF
(
n/a
)
-
CSV
(
n/a
)
- OnLine resource
-
Data_Dictionary_Dictionnaire_de_données.pdf
(
HTTPS
)
Supporting Document;PDF;eng,fra
- OnLine resource
-
Killer whale sighting data 2002-2023.csv
(
HTTPS
)
Dataset;CSV;eng,fra
- OnLine resource
-
Supplementary_Citation_List_Liste_de_citation_supplémentaire.pdf
(
HTTPS
)
Supporting Document;PDF;eng,fra
- OnLine resource
-
open_data_donnees_ouvertes/killer_whale_range_presence_eastern_canada_arctic_2002_2023
(
ESRI REST: Map Service
)
Web Service;ESRI REST;eng
- OnLine resource
-
open_data_donnees_ouvertes/killer_whale_range_presence_eastern_canada_arctic_2002_2023
(
ESRI REST: Map Service
)
Web Service;ESRI REST;fra
- File identifier
- b43be740-1496-11f0-9b16-cdaf3d076dbf XML
- Metadata language
- eng; CAN
- Character set
- utf8; utf8 RI_458
- Hierarchy level
- dataset; jeuDonnées RI_622
- Date stamp
- 2025-07-31T16:24:58.757Z
- Metadata standard name
- North American Profile of ISO 19115:2003 - Geographic information - Metadata
- Metadata standard version
- CAN/CGSB-171.100-2009
Overviews

Spatial extent
))
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