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Using earthquake sensors to track endangered whales

By Guest PostJune 19, 2013Natureamplitude, behavior, dax soule, deep ocean environments, earth, earthquake sensor, earthquake sensor data, endangered whales, fin whale surfacing, gps, greenland, greyhounds, juan de fuca, michelle weirathmueller, neptune canada, oceanography, pacific northwest coast, ridge, sea, seafloor geology, seafloor seismic data, seafloor seismometers, seattle area, second largest animal, seismically active zone, seismometer networks, smartphone, swimming behavior, track, university of washington, uw doctoral student, vocalizing whale, washington coast, whale calls, william wilcock

The fin whale is the second-largest animal ever to live on Earth. It is also, paradoxically, one of the least understood. The animal’s huge size and global range make its movements and behavior hard to study.

A carcass that washed up on a Seattle-area beach this spring provided a reminder that sleek fin whales, nicknamed “greyhounds of the sea,” are vulnerable to collision when they strike fast-moving ships. Knowing their swimming behaviors could help vessels avoid the animals. Understanding where and what they eat could also help support the fin whale’s slowly rebounding populations. (more…)

Scientists Use Marine Robots to Detect Endangered Whales

By Guest PostJanuary 27, 2013Environment, Natureacoustic research group, baleen whales, bar harbor, ben hodges, callosities, cinar, dave fratantoni, detect, detection system, digital acoustic monitoring, dmon, dynamic management area, ecologists, endangered species, endangered whales, endeavor, fin, gliders, gps position, gulf challenger, gulf of maine, hearing the whales, hole, humpback, instrument, interactions, knowledge gap, marianna hagbloom, marine robots, mark baumgartner, mark johnson, nefsc, new england aquarium, new hampshire, nick woods, noaa, north atlantic, northeast fisheries, ocean going robots, oceanographic institution, outer fall, passive, portsmouth, profile, research vessel, rhode island, right whales, salinity, science center, scientists, sea surface, sei, sofie van parijs, temperature, tiny crustaceans, tom hurst, transmit data, university, use of technology, whoi, woods, zooplankton

Two robots equipped with instruments designed to “listen” for the calls of baleen whales detected nine endangered North Atlantic right whales in the Gulf of Maine last month. The robots reported the detections to shore-based researchers within hours of hearing the whales (i.e., in real time), demonstrating a new and powerful tool for managing interactions between whales and human activities.

The team of researchers, led by Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) scientists Mark Baumgartner and Dave Fratantoni, reported their sightings to NOAA, the federal agency responsible for enforcing the Marine Mammal Protection Act. NOAA Fisheries Service, in turn, put in place on Dec. 5 a “dynamic management area,” asking mariners to voluntarily slow their vessel speed to avoid striking the animals. (more…)

Critically Endangered Whales Sing Like Birds; New Recordings Hint At Rebound

By Guest PostAugust 1, 2012Natureacoustics, alaskan beaufort sea, Arctic, Arctic sea ice, birds, bowhead whales, breeding ground, catherine berchok, christian lydersen, commercial whaling, declines, endangered whales, fram strait, greenland, hydrophone, islands of norway, kate stafford, microphones, migration path, population, sing, skull, sue moore, university of washington, variety of tunes, whale song

When a University of Washington researcher listened to the audio picked up by a recording device that spent a year in the icy waters off the east coast of Greenland, she was stunned at what she heard: whales singing a remarkable variety of songs nearly constantly for five wintertime months.

Kate Stafford, an oceanographer with UW’s Applied Physics Lab, set out to find if any endangered bowhead whales passed through the Fram Strait, an inhospitable, ice-covered stretch of sea between Greenland and the northern islands of Norway. Only around 40 sightings of bowhead whales, which were hunted almost to extinction, have been reported there since the 1970s. (more…)

Tag Archives: endangered whales

Using earthquake sensors to track endangered whales

Scientists Use Marine Robots to Detect Endangered Whales

Critically Endangered Whales Sing Like Birds; New Recordings Hint At Rebound