The evolution of Arctic marine mammals.

This review deals only with the evolutionary history of core Arctic marine mammals: polar bear (Ursus maritimus), walrus (Odobenus rosmarus), bearded seal (Erignathus barbatus), harp seal (Pagophilus groenlandica), ringed seal (Phoca hispida), bowhead whale (Balaena mysticetus), white whale (Delphinapterus leucas), and narwhal (Monodon monoceras). Sections on the evolutionary background of pinnipeds and whales help to provide a better perspective on these core species. Polar bears stemmed from brown bears about the Early to Middle Pleistocene. Fossils are rare; the earliest records are from approximately Early Weichselian deposits of Kew Bridge, London, and Svalbard. Existing Pacific and Atlantic walruses probably arose from splitting of a former Holarctic range during a Pleistocene glacial phase of extensive sea ice in the Canadian Arctic. The earliest known bearded seal remains are from Early to Middle Pleistocene deposits of Norfolk, England, and Cape Deceit, Alaska. Other Pleistocene fossils of this species are recorded from the North Sea, southwestern Sweden, and the Champlain Sea that existed in eastern North America approximately 12 000-10000 BP. The harp seal is the commonest pinniped in the Weichselian deposits of the southern North Sea. The earliest recorded fossil is from about 2 million years ago (2 Ma), from Ocean Point, Alaska. The earliest known Pleistocene ringed seal fossils are from last interglacial deposits near Teshekpuk Lake, Alaska, and Thule, Greenland, although an earlier (3 Ma?) specimen from Malaspina, Alaska, has been reported. This species seems to have been relatively abundant along the coasts of Prince of Wales Island, Alaska, during the Last Glacial Maximum. The bowhead whale probably originated in the high latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere. The earliest (mid-Wisconsinan) Canadian remains are from Ellesmere and Devon islands. More than 400 radiocarbon-dated bowhead remains have been used to reconstruct Holocene sea ice history in the Canadian Arctic. White whales are common in the late warming stage (approximately 10 500 BP) of the Champlain Sea and are one of the commonest marine mammal fossils in Late Pleistocene North Sea deposits. Fourteen narwhal specimens of Late Glacial or Early Holocene age are known from Atlantic Canada, as well as Ellesmere, Baffin, and Prince of Wales islands in Arctic Canada. Arctic marine mammals have tended to shift to more southerly ranges during glacial phases of the Pleistocene.