Steller's Sea Cow

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iSteller's Sea Cow

Scientific classification

Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Mammalia
Order:	Sirenia
Family:	Dugongidae
Subfamily:	Hydrodamalinae Palmer, 1895
Genus:	Hydrodamalis Retzius, 1794
Species:	H. gigas

Binomial name

Hydrodamalis gigas
(Zimmermann, 1780)

Steller's Sea Cow (Hydrodamalis gigas) is an extinct large sirenian mammal formerly found near the Asiatic coast of the Bering Sea. It was discovered in the Bering Strait in 1741 by the naturalist Georg Steller, who was traveling with the explorer Vitus Bering. A small population lived in the arctic waters around Bering Island and nearby Copper Island. However, prior to the arrival of humans they lived all along the North Pacific coast.

The sea cow grew up to 7.9 meters long and weighed up to 11 tons, much larger than the manatee or dugong. It looked somewhat like a large seal, but had two stout forelimbs and a whale-like tail. According to Steller, "The animal never comes out on shore, but always lives in the water. Its skin is black and thick, like the bark of an old oak..., its head in proportion to the body is small..., it has no teeth, but only two flat white bones—one above, the other below". It was completely tame, according to Steller. They fed on a variety of kelp. Wherever sea cows had been feeding, heaps of stalks and roots of kelp were washed ashore.

The population of sea cows was small in number and limited in range when Steller first described them. They were wiped out quickly by the sailors, seal hunters, and fur traders that followed Bering's route past the islands to Alaska, who hunted them both for food and for their skins, which were used to make boats. They were also hunted for their valuable subcutaneous fat, which was not only used for food (usually as a butter substitute), but also for oil lamps because it did not give off any smoke or odor and could be kept for a long time in warm weather without spoiling. By 1768, less than 30 years after it had been discovered, Steller's Sea Cow was extinct.

Stellers Sea Cow

Fossils indicate that Steller's Sea Cow was formerly widespread along the North Pacific coast, reaching south to Japan and California. Given the rapidity with which its last population was eliminated, it is likely that the arrival of humans in the area was the cause of its extinction elsewhere as well.

There are still sporadic reports of sea cow-like animals from the Bering area, the Arctic, and Greenland, so it has been suggested that small populations of the animal may have survived to the present day. This remains so far unproven.

Sea Cows appear in Rudyard Kipling's short story "The White Seal", where they show the title character a place of refuge from human hunters. Kipling probably knew (a) that the Sea Cow was considered extinct and that (b) nevertheless people sometimes claimed to have seen them. Thus, his suggestion is that they are around, but mostly hiding.

[edit] References

Anderson, P. 1995. Competition, predation, and the evolution and extinction of Steller's sea cow, Hydrodamalis gigas. Marine Mammal Science, 11: 391-394.
World Conservation Monitoring Centre (1996). Hydrodamalis gigas. 2006 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. IUCN 2006. Retrieved on 11 May 2006. Database entry includes a brief justification of why this species is listed as extinct
Shoshani, Jeheskel (November 16, 2005). Wilson, D. E., and Reeder, D. M. (eds): Mammal Species of the World, 3rd edition, Johns Hopkins University Press, 92. ISBN 0-801-88221-4.