Residues of Persistent Organochlorine Contaminants in Southern Elephant Seals from Elephant Island, Antarctica

This dataset reports a study about blubber samples (n = 129) from live and apparently healthy female and male pups, juveniles and adults of M. leonine (elephant seal) caught at Elephant Island in the Antarctica Peninsula (61º13'S-55º23'W) during 1997/1998, 1998/1999, and 1999/2000 austral summers. It was found that DDT compounds and PCBs are the most accumulated POPs in the blubber of elephant seals. The relative importance of other OC pesticides in blubber tissue, such as mirex, methoxychlor, dieldrin, and -HCH, indicates that pesticides used either currently or in the recent past in countries in the southern hemisphere are the sources of contamination in the Antarctic region. Pups and juveniles of elephant seals had accumulated significant quantities of persistent contaminants as a result of contaminant transfer from mother seals through transplacental and lactational routes and therefore monitoring of marine mammals from Antarctica should continue to evaluate whether the concentrations of these compounds are increasing over time.