https://reasonstobecheerful.world/acoustics-technology-saving-whales/
"On a gray morning this past March, a half-dozen scientists scanned the sea
while bobbing offshore of Chile’s Atacama Desert. When an enormous whale
surfaced, their small boat zoomed over to meet it. Marine biologist Susannah
Buchan strapped on a waist harness, leaned out over the bow and waited. As the
fin whale porpoised again, she placed a forearm-sized neon orange tracker near
its dorsal fin. The team would retrieve the tracker the next morning after its
suction cups released to download the whale’s movements and listen to its
vocalizations.
Fin whales are the world’s second-largest whale species. You might not have
heard much about them since “they aren’t the biggest, the jumpiest or the most
vocal of whales,” Buchan says. Instead, their claim to fame is more depressing:
Fins are the whales most frequently killed by large ships.
Buchan has been tagging fin and blue whales — both of which are listed as
endangered species — for the past five years in Chile, in hopes of collecting
data that will help ships avoid hitting them. What she’s learning from
listening to their underwater sounds might save the lives of some of the
largest animals to ever live on our planet."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
