To understand environmental factors influencing Hawaiian monk seal exposure to Toxoplasma gondii, we examined monk seal strandings from toxoplasmosis in relationship to location and rainfall patterns throughout the main Hawaiian Islands.
By examining sighting histories, we infer that 25 unobserved pupping events that had previously gone uncounted. This is the highest reproductive rate reported for any of the Hawaiian monk seal breeding sites.
In this analysis, we quantify not only the frequency of specific causes‐of‐death (CODs) among main Hawaiian Island monk seals, but also assess the impact of individual CODs on the intrinsic growth rate, λ, of this population.
