NEW BEDFORD, Mass. — North Atlantic Right Whales are one of the most endangered species. There are fewer than 400 of these whales left in the world.
For several months a year, these giant marine mammals call the waters off the Massachusetts coast home.
Scientists with the Massachusetts State Division of Marine Fisheries have launched a new program to track where and when the whales are in this vicinity.
Traditionally, scientists relied of visual reports from the air to ascertain exactly which areas the whales were populating.
Leah Crowe, the science and monitoring lead for the protected species program at the DMF, says it’s important to know exactly where the whales are because their decline in numbers is associated with human interactions.
Specifically, the whales are colliding with large ships or getting entangled in fishing nets.
“Monitoring for whales is an important part of having an understanding of where and when they are in our waters so that we can focus our protections on them,” explained Erin Burke, protected species program manager at DMF.
Trying to find whales from the air had problems added Burke. Weather, daylight, and funding all reduced the ability to gather a good population count.
Earlier this year, the state along with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, started deploying passive acoustic monitors along the coastline.
“The Cape Cod Bay real-time buoy was deployed in the middle of Cape Cod Bay at the end of February, and as soon as that buoy went in the water, we had acoustic detections of right whales every single day until about the beginning of May,” Crowe said.
A second ‘live” buoy is off Cape Ann.
“The two real-time buoys transit every two hours,” said Burke. The information is relayed via satellite.
The buoys capture the what’s known as the upcall, a noise all right whales make regardless of age or gender.
17 additional buoys record audio on site and then the data is retrieved every couple of months.
All that material would take about three years to play in real time said Crowe.
“We use computer tools to look for specific signatures in the sound data to help us pull out those signals.”
It’s too soon to say if all this data will lead to direct changes in shipping and fishing rules.
Burke said, “The overall goal of collecting this information is that we can use it to develop future conservation strategies that would get at the risk of entanglements and vessel collisions so that we can draft more strategic regulations based on where and when the whales are.”
That’s something that could become more important as climate change warms the ocean. A change in temperature influences the migratory patterns of many species.
“I think real time listening has a really important conservation impact so in times maybe when we aren’t expecting whales to be in places, it’s still active and looking for detections,” said Crowe. “It’s a really important tool.”
The buoys pick up all kinds of sounds from the ocean including cod grunting and haddock calls.
Although those scientists aren’t studying those noises, they’re open to collaborating with researchers who might interested in that data.
The North Atlantic right whale is the official state marine mammal of Massachusetts.
It has the same designation in Georgia.
This is a developing story. Check back for updates as more information becomes available.
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