Whale calls recorded during a seismic survey in the Gulf of California. Color indicates the loudness of the sounds, with yellow the loudest. The bright yellow signals ranging from about 17 to 30 Hertz are calls from fin whales.
Dan Lizarralde/WHOI
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GoingBlue:OceanLandscapesNeedProtection
View Caption +#1: Wear Blue for Oceans Day
Choose your favorite hue of blue to support the world's oceans today. Wear Blue For Oceans Day is Wednesday, Jan. 13, 2010. Event organizers are asking Americans to wear blue to show support for a federal ocean, coastline and Great Lakes protection policy. Take a closer look at the creatures that inhabit the ocean deep, and find out why these ecosystems are worth protecting.
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View Caption +#2: The Arctic
Arctic seals depend on the frigid waters and floating ice sheets of the Arctic Ocean for hunting and breeding. Seal pups need at least 12 days on the ice to nurse before they are strong enough to venture out.
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View Caption +#3: Polar Waters
A humpback whale breaches the waters of the Icy Strait near Alaska. A network of mostly freshwater rivers and seas, this fragile ecosystem is slow to recover from disruptions or damage.
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A school of sardines swims off the coast of Canada. Most of the largest fisheries in the world rely on sardines to feed profitable, top predator fish such as tuna.
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Giant kelp float freely near Anacapa Island, Calif. in the Pacific Ocean. Kelp forests are vitally important because they create shelter and provide nutrients for fish and algae.
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View Caption +#6: West Pacific Ocean
A giant squid attacks a bait squid being pulled up by a marine research team off the Ogasawara Islands, south of Tokyo, in 2006. The giant squid is still a bit of a mystery to marine biologists, who have only begun to understand this elusive beast in recent years.
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View Caption +#7: South Pacific Ocean
Regal Angelfish and Moorish Idols, with a school of Bigeye Scad in the background, swim gracefully over coral reef near West Papua, Indonesia in the South Pacific. Coral reefs not only attract a rich and colorful variety of sea creatures; they also actually generate life, as reported in a recent Discovery News story.
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View Caption +#8: East Indian Ocean
A sea star waits patiently for a meal on a reef near Komodo Island, Indonesia. Discovery News' Michael Reilly recently found out that starfish and other ocean dwellers are aiding in the fight against global warming by sucking millions of tons of carbon from the atmosphere.
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An ocean shelf looms through the crystal clear waters near the Maldives. These calm waters are home to thousands of animals, including whales and dolphins.
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This great white shark closes in for the kill near North Neptune Island in south Australian waters. A top predator of the oceans, the great white is already endangered as a result of poaching and habitat loss.
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View Caption +#11: Southern Ocean, Antarctica
Warming has carved out fantastic icebergs and icy chunks from the Collins Ice Cap in Antarctica. The continent holds almost two-thirds of the world's fresh water. Melting ice could mean not only a loss of habitats for wildlife, but also for humans as rising sea levels flood coastal cities and towns. "Wear Blue for Oceans" Day events and rallies will be held in 10 cities across the nation, including Washington D.C., San Francisco, New Orleans, and Anchorage, Alaska. To learn more about the campaign and how you can help, visit their website.
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Tiny People Swim With the Fishes: Photos
A rich, but untapped trove of whale calls hides in decades of recordings collected by geologists surveying the ocean floor.
The recordings come from seismic studies that shoot powerful air guns underwater to jiggle the Earth and learn more about its makeup. Sensors listen to acoustic waves in the water before, during and after the shots, capturing the reflections from the ground. But they can also pick up songs from any passing marine life that chats on the same frequency — fin whales and blue whales, in this case.
Extracting those squeals, squeaks and moans from the recordings could greatly improve scientist's understanding of the air gun's effects on whales. The noise could potentially confuse or even harm marine life, according to researchers at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) in Woods Hole, Mass. The calls may reveal how whale behavior changes in response to the sudden, sharp bursts in many different settings.
"We're really excited about the potential for it," said Laela Sayigh, a WHOI marine biologist. "There is a treasure trove of data."
The cruise included onboard observers to track the effects of airguns on marine life, so scientists could potentially link calls to individual animals by matching the calls with those observations.
"We have a huge amount of data that can say, 'Did they change their behavior? Did they stop feeding? Did they stop talking? Did they talk louder?', and that's what we want to know," said WHOI seismologist Dan Lizarralde.
For now, the project is only an idea, because Sayigh and Lizarralde have no money for the research. Woods Hole turned the researchers down for an internal grant. This month they will apply for a grant from the Navy, which uses sonar and underwater explosions during training, and funds research exploring the effects of ocean noise on marine life.
Whale researchers have tracked the animals with underwater devices for decades, said Susan Parks, a bioacoustics expert at Pennsylvania State University who studies right whales with underwater recordings. "This is proven technology," she said. "I think it's an interesting idea, and it's really quite promising," she said. (Video: Listen to whale calls)
Dorian Houser, director of bioacoustical research for the National Marine Mammals Foundation, said Sayigh's and Lizarralde' project has potential. "We are really in the dark in a lot of the response of the animals to (ocean noise)," Houser told OurAmazingPlanet. "There's a big push to try and understand these exact questions: How does a whale's behavior change when they are exposed to these exact sounds, and what is the consequence?"
Sayigh thinks the project may also answer questions about the beaching of two Cuvier's beaked whales. Those whales came ashore while the 2002 research cruise that collected this data was in the Gulf, and the cruise was accused of playing a role in the deaths. "They know the exact amplitude of all their shots, and could extrapolate the likely location for the whales," Sayigh said.
If Sayigh and Lizarralde succeed in getting funding, there's a huge archive of seismic data waiting for future studies. Since 1999, all recordings from research cruises like Lizarralde's, funded by the National Science Foundation, go into an open-access archive called IRIS, the Incorporated Research Institutions for Seismology.
"We'll keep trying," Lizarralde said. "I really want to see what the behavior is associated with these air guns.
"I've convinced myself from observations that the whales are completely uninterested, that it's probably annoying but not damaging, but I'd like to know that better," he said.
More from LiveScience's OurAmazingPlanet:
Fonte: http://news.discovery.com/earth/oceans/whale-calls-seismic-data-130315.htm
The recordings come from seismic studies that shoot powerful air guns underwater to jiggle the Earth and learn more about its makeup. Sensors listen to acoustic waves in the water before, during and after the shots, capturing the reflections from the ground. But they can also pick up songs from any passing marine life that chats on the same frequency — fin whales and blue whales, in this case.
Extracting those squeals, squeaks and moans from the recordings could greatly improve scientist's understanding of the air gun's effects on whales. The noise could potentially confuse or even harm marine life, according to researchers at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) in Woods Hole, Mass. The calls may reveal how whale behavior changes in response to the sudden, sharp bursts in many different settings.
"We're really excited about the potential for it," said Laela Sayigh, a WHOI marine biologist. "There is a treasure trove of data."
ANALYSIS: Do Dolphins Sleep Talk in Whale?
Funding needed
The goal: Create a computer algorithm to extract the whale calls from data collected during a 2002 research cruise in Mexico's Gulf of California. The Gulf is a birthing ground for blue whales, and teems with marine life. Researchers will analyze whale behavior before, during and after the air gun blasts.The cruise included onboard observers to track the effects of airguns on marine life, so scientists could potentially link calls to individual animals by matching the calls with those observations.
"We have a huge amount of data that can say, 'Did they change their behavior? Did they stop feeding? Did they stop talking? Did they talk louder?', and that's what we want to know," said WHOI seismologist Dan Lizarralde.
For now, the project is only an idea, because Sayigh and Lizarralde have no money for the research. Woods Hole turned the researchers down for an internal grant. This month they will apply for a grant from the Navy, which uses sonar and underwater explosions during training, and funds research exploring the effects of ocean noise on marine life.
VIDEO: Weirdest Sharks in the Sea!
Ocean noise and marine life
Parking hydrophones underwater to listen to whales is not new, but looking for the calls in seismic survey data is. As long as whales are calling, this precise method of monitoring them could track individuals and groups of whales through the water, showing researchers how the whales react to the blasts, Sayigh said.Whale researchers have tracked the animals with underwater devices for decades, said Susan Parks, a bioacoustics expert at Pennsylvania State University who studies right whales with underwater recordings. "This is proven technology," she said. "I think it's an interesting idea, and it's really quite promising," she said. (Video: Listen to whale calls)
Dorian Houser, director of bioacoustical research for the National Marine Mammals Foundation, said Sayigh's and Lizarralde' project has potential. "We are really in the dark in a lot of the response of the animals to (ocean noise)," Houser told OurAmazingPlanet. "There's a big push to try and understand these exact questions: How does a whale's behavior change when they are exposed to these exact sounds, and what is the consequence?"
Sayigh thinks the project may also answer questions about the beaching of two Cuvier's beaked whales. Those whales came ashore while the 2002 research cruise that collected this data was in the Gulf, and the cruise was accused of playing a role in the deaths. "They know the exact amplitude of all their shots, and could extrapolate the likely location for the whales," Sayigh said.
If Sayigh and Lizarralde succeed in getting funding, there's a huge archive of seismic data waiting for future studies. Since 1999, all recordings from research cruises like Lizarralde's, funded by the National Science Foundation, go into an open-access archive called IRIS, the Incorporated Research Institutions for Seismology.
"We'll keep trying," Lizarralde said. "I really want to see what the behavior is associated with these air guns.
"I've convinced myself from observations that the whales are completely uninterested, that it's probably annoying but not damaging, but I'd like to know that better," he said.
More from LiveScience's OurAmazingPlanet:
- In Photos: Tracking Humpback Whales
- Humpback Whales Sing Their Tunes
- 10 Amazing Things You Didn't Know about Animals
Fonte: http://news.discovery.com/earth/oceans/whale-calls-seismic-data-130315.htm
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