Pusa

Pusa is a genus of the earless seals, within the family Phocidae. The three species of this genus were split from the genus Phoca, and some sources still give Phoca as an acceptable synonym for Pusa.

This article is about a genus of marine mammals. For other uses, see Pusa (disambiguation).

Pusa
Baikal seal
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Mammalia
Order: Carnivora
Clade: Pinnipediformes
Clade: Pinnipedia
Family: Phocidae
Tribe: Phocini
Genus: Pusa
Scopoli, 1771
Species

Pusa caspica
Pusa hispida
Pusa sibirica

The three species in this genus are found in Arctic and subarctic regions, as well as around the Caspian Sea. This includes these countries and regions: Russia, Finland, Scandinavia, Britain, Greenland, Canada, the United States, Iran, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and Japan. Due to changing local environmental conditions, the ringed seals found in the Canadian region has varied patterns of growth. The northern Canadian ringed seals grow slowly to a larger size, while the southern seals grow quickly to a smaller size.

Only the Caspian seal species of Pusa is endangered, while two subspecies of the Ringed seal are vulnerable and endangered, Ladoga seal and Saimaa ringed seal respectively.

Species
ImageScientific nameCommon NameDistribution
Pusa caspica – (Gmelin, 1788)Caspian sealCaspian Sea
Pusa hispida – (Schreber, 1775)Ringed sealnorthern coast of Japan in the Pacific, and throughout the North Atlantic coasts of Greenland and Scandinavia as far south as Newfoundland, and include two freshwater subspecies in northern Europe
Pusa sibirica – Gmelin, 1788Baikal seal or nerpaLake Baikal in Siberia, Russia

Taxonomy
Pusa
 
 

ringed seal

 
 

Baikal seal

 
 
 

Caspian seal

 
 
Cladogram showing relationships among the extant members of genus Pusa, combining several phylogenetic analyses.[1]
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References
  1. Berta, A.; Churchill, M. (2012). "Pinniped taxonomy: Review of currently recognized species and subspecies, and evidence used for their description". Mammal Review. 42 (3): 207–34. doi:10.1111/j.1365-2907.2011.00193.x.
  • Ferguson, Steven H.; et al. (2018). "Geographic Variation in Ringed Seal (Pusa Hispida) Growth Rate and Body Size". Canadian Journal of Zoology. 96 (7): 649–659. doi:10.1139/cjz-2017-0213.


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