The
ringed seal (
Pusa hispida or
Phoca hispida), also known as the
jar seal and as
netsik or
nattiq by the
Inuit, is an
earless seal (family: Phocidae) inhabiting the
Arctic and
sub-Arctic regions. The ringed seal is a relatively small seal, rarely greater than 1.5 m in length, with a distinctive patterning of dark spots surrounded by light grey rings, whence its common name. It is the most abundant and wide-ranging
ice seal in the Northern Hemisphere: ranging throughout the
Arctic Ocean, into the
Bering Sea and
Okhotsk Sea as far south as the northern coast of
Japan in the
Pacific, and throughout the
North Atlantic coasts of
Greenland and
Scandinavia as far south as
Newfoundland, and include two freshwater subspecies in
northern Europe. Ringed seals are one of the primary prey of
polar bears and have long been a component of the diet of indigenous people of the Arctic.