Earless seal

Not to be confused with Phocides, a genus of butterflies, Pholcidae, a family of spiders, or Phocoenidae, a family of toothed whales.

Earless seals[2]
Temporal range: Aquitanian–present Early Miocene – Holocene, possible late Oligocene record[1]
Harbor seal, Phoca vitulina
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Mammalia
Order: Carnivora
Clade: Pinnipedia
Superfamily: Phocoidea
Family: Phocidae
Gray, 1821
Type genus
Phoca
Linnaeus, 1758
Subfamilies

The earless seals, phocids, or true seals are one of the three main groups of mammals within the seal lineage, Pinnipedia. All true seals are members of the family Phocidae (/ˈfoʊsɪdiː/). They are sometimes called crawling seals to distinguish them from the fur seals and sea lions of the family Otariidae. Seals live in the oceans of both hemispheres and, with the exception of the more tropical monk seals, are mostly confined to polar, subpolar, and temperate climates. The Baikal seal is the only species of exclusively freshwater seal.

  1. ^ Leonard Dewaele; Olivier Lambert; Stephen Louwye (2018). "A critical revision of the fossil record, stratigraphy and diversity of the Neogene seal genus Monotherium (Carnivora, Phocidae)". Royal Society Open Science. 5 (5): 171669. Bibcode:2018RSOS....571669D. doi:10.1098/rsos.171669. PMC 5990722. PMID 29892365.
  2. ^ Wozencraft, W. C. (2005). "Order Carnivora". In Wilson, D. E.; Reeder, D. M. (eds.). Mammal Species of the World: A Taxonomic and Geographic Reference (3rd ed.). Johns Hopkins University Press. ISBN 978-0-8018-8221-0. OCLC 62265494.