Animalia > Chordata > Mammalia > Carnivora > Otariidae > Zalophus > Zalophus californianus

Zalophus californianus (California Sealion; California sea lion)

Synonyms:
Language: Spanish

Wikipedia Abstract

The California sea lion (Zalophus californianus) is a coastal eared seal native to western North America. It is one of five species of sea lion. Its natural habitat ranges from southeast Alaska to central Mexico, including the Gulf of California. Sea lions are sexually dimorphic, males are larger than females, and have a thicker neck and protruding crest. They mainly haul-out on sandy or rocky beaches, but they also frequent manmade environments such as marinas and wharves. Sea lions feed on a number of species of fish and squid, and are preyed on by orcas and white sharks.
View Wikipedia Record: Zalophus californianus

EDGE Analysis

Uniqueness Scale: Similiar (0) 
3
 Unique (100)
Uniqueness & Vulnerability Scale: Similiar & Secure (0) 
22
 Unique & Vulnerable (100)
ED Score: 7.87
EDGE Score: 2.18
Learn more at EDGE of Existence programme

Attributes

Gestation [3]  8 months 19 days
Litter Size [3]  1
Litters / Year [3]  1
Maximum Longevity [3]  36 years
Snout to Vent Length [2]  7.413 feet (226 cm)
Speed [5]  13.422 MPH (6 m/s)
Water Biome [1]  Rivers and Streams, Coastal
Weaning [3]  10 months 15 days
Adult Weight [2]  551.159 lbs (250.00 kg)
Birth Weight [3]  15.432 lbs (7.00 kg)
Female Weight [2]  242.51 lbs (110.00 kg)
Male Weight [2]  859.807 lbs (390.00 kg)
Weight Dimorphism [2]  254.5 %
Diet [1]  Carnivore
Forages - Marine [4]  100 %
Female Maturity [3]  3 years
Male Maturity [3]  5 years

Protected Areas

Biodiversity Hotspots

Name Location Endemic Species Website
California Floristic Province Mexico, United States No
Tumbes-Choco-Magdalena Colombia, Ecuador, Panama, Peru No

Prey / Diet

Prey / Diet Overlap

Predators

Consumers

Range Map

External References

NatureServe Explorer

Citations

Attributes / relations provided by
♦ 1Myers, P., R. Espinosa, C. S. Parr, T. Jones, G. S. Hammond, and T. A. Dewey. 2006. The Animal Diversity Web (online). Accessed February 01, 2010 at animaldiversity.org
♦ 2Nathan P. Myhrvold, Elita Baldridge, Benjamin Chan, Dhileep Sivam, Daniel L. Freeman, and S. K. Morgan Ernest. 2015. An amniote life-history database to perform comparative analyses with birds, mammals, and reptiles. Ecology 96:3109
♦ 3de Magalhaes, J. P., and Costa, J. (2009) A database of vertebrate longevity records and their relation to other life-history traits. Journal of Evolutionary Biology 22(8):1770-1774
♦ 4Hamish Wilman, Jonathan Belmaker, Jennifer Simpson, Carolina de la Rosa, Marcelo M. Rivadeneira, and Walter Jetz. 2014. EltonTraits 1.0: Species-level foraging attributes of the world's birds and mammals. Ecology 95:2027
♦ 5Wikipedia licensed under a Creative Commons License
♦ 6Szoboszlai AI, Thayer JA, Wood SA, Sydeman WJ, Koehn LE (2015) Forage species in predator diets: synthesis of data from the California Current. Ecological Informatics 29(1): 45-56. Szoboszlai AI, Thayer JA, Wood SA, Sydeman WJ, Koehn LE (2015) Data from: Forage species in predator diets: synthesis of data from the California Current. Dryad Digital Repository.
♦ 7Jorrit H. Poelen, James D. Simons and Chris J. Mungall. (2014). Global Biotic Interactions: An open infrastructure to share and analyze species-interaction datasets. Ecological Informatics.
♦ 8Seasonal and Annual Variability in the Diet of California Sea Lions Zalophus californianus at San Nicolas Island, California, 1981 -86, Mark S. Lowry, Brent S. Stewart, Carolyn B. Heath, Pamela K. Yochem, John M. Francis, Fishery Bulletin. U.S. 89:331-336 (1991)
♦ 9CephBase - Cephalopod (Octopus, Squid, Cuttlefish and Nautilus) Database
♦ 10Food Web Relationships of Northern Puget Sound and the Strait of Juan de Fuca : a Synthesis of the Available Knowledge, Charles A. Simenstad, Bruce S. Miller, Carl F. Nyblade, Kathleen Thornburgh, and Lewis J. Bledsoe, EPA-600 7-29-259 September 1979
♦ 11Gibson, D. I., Bray, R. A., & Harris, E. A. (Compilers) (2005). Host-Parasite Database of the Natural History Museum, London
♦ 12Nunn, C. L., and S. Altizer. 2005. The Global Mammal Parasite Database: An Online Resource for Infectious Disease Records in Wild Primates. Evolutionary Anthroplogy 14:1-2.
Biodiversity Hotspots provided by Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund
Abstract provided by DBpedia licensed under a Creative Commons License
Species taxanomy provided by GBIF Secretariat (2022). GBIF Backbone Taxonomy. Checklist dataset https://doi.org/10.15468/39omei accessed via GBIF.org on 2023-06-13; License: CC BY 4.0