Steller Sea Lion

The Steller sea lion, also known as Steller's sea lion or the northern sea lion, is a large, near-threatened species of sea lion found predominantly in the coastal marine habitats of the northeast Pacific Ocean, from north-central California through Oregon, Washington, British Columbia and Alaska, and across the northern Pacific and Aleutian Islands to Kamchatka, Magadan Oblast and the Sea of Okhotsk. It is the sole member of the genus Eumetopias and the largest of the eared seals, smaller among pinnipeds only than the walrus and the two species of elephant seal; named for the naturalist Georg Wilhelm Steller, who first described it in 1741, it has attracted considerable scientific and public attention in recent decades because of significant declines in its numbers across an extensive portion of its northern range, notably in Alaska.