Female southern elephant seals are thought to locate their food in deep, dark waters by detecting the bioluminescence of their prey. The seals see best at the wavelength of light produced by bioluminescent organisms.
Jade Vacquié-Garcia at the Chizé Centre for Biological Studies in Villiers-en-Bois, part of the French National Centre for Scientific Research, and her team tested the idea by studying four female southern elephant seals (Mirounga leonina; pictured) living on the Kerguelen islands in the southern Indian Ocean. The researchers used satellite tracking to follow the animals as they made a total of 3,386 dives, and a light sensor to measure bioluminescence. During the dives, the seals' foraging intensity was positively related to the number of bioluminescence events.
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Seals see glowing prey. Nature 489, 180 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/489180a
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/489180a
