Recent satellite tagging studies have shown that some seals make extensive feeding trips of several hundred miles from the Chukchi Sea coast to the western Chukchi Sea and back. Some seals move down the Chukotka Peninsula coast and then into the central Bering Sea. Others seem to move down the Alaska coast. By midwinter they are again concentrated in the southern part of the Bering Sea pack. It is noteworthy that spotted seals are abundant along the northwest coast during months of open water and are replaced in that zone by ringed seals when extensive ice is present.
Spotted seals are comparatively wary and difficult to approach openly.
They form large aggregations on the ice and at favored locations on lands. The largest land aggregations in Alaska are at Kasegaluk Lagoon in the Chukchi Sea, near Cape Espenburg in Kotzebue Sound, and on bars and shoals in Kuskokwim Bay. Several thousand seals may be hauled out together in these areas. There is considerable individual variability in the amount of time spotted seals spend hauled out, ranging from 6 to 30 percent. Little is known about their vocalizations.