Study Sheds New Light on Blue Whales and Their Calls
In one recently published study on blue whales, Scripps researchers, led by Erin Oleson and John Hildebrand of MPL, used a combination of techniques to show for the first time that blue whale calls can be tied to specific behavior and gender classifications. In a separate study, researchers used recordings of blue whale songs to determine the animal's population distributions worldwide.
The first study, led by Scripps/MPL postdoctoral researcher Erin Oleson and Scripps/MPL scientist John Hildebrand, describes the behavioral context of calls produced by eastern North Pacific blue whales. Few researchers have attempted to link sound production with specific behaviors or environmental conditions to attempt to determine the significance of whale calls.
The second study, published in a recent issue of the Journal of Cetacean Research Management, describes the first attempt at determining worldwide blue whale populations by analyzing nuances of their songs. Hildebrand and his colleagues used acoustic recordings from around the world, including data from his own instrument deployments and recordings from other scientists and the U.S. Navy, to create a new map that geographically categorizes blue whale species types into nine regions around the world based on their song "dialects."
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