Right Whale Research Blog

12/31/09

#10 Sometimes the Whales Come to Us

In a unique (but not extraordinary) circumstance, Jess received a call from our pilot Ryan a few evenings ago after the two observers for the day, Suzie and Karen, had already returned to the house to write up their survey data. Ryan told Jess that after flying the EWS right whale survey, he had gone up on a recreational flight with a friend and had spotted two North Atlantic right whales just off American Beach on Amelia Island, a mere five miles down the beach from our observer house. Trying to beat the quickly approaching darkness, Jess grabbed the survey camera and headed down to the spot where Ryan had seen the whales. Since I was out and about picking up groceries I met up with Jess at the beach, who was trying to take the best photographs possible in the waning light.

Jess snaps photographs of the calf, half of who's fluke and flipper is visible farther offshore.

Once on the beach, the whales were not hard to spot. They were only one to two hundred yards from where the waves crashed onto shore, and one of them, a small calf, was rolling and splashing, bringing its already enormous paddle-shaped flippers out of the water and smacking them on the surface and also posturing, a common right whale behavior in which the whale's tail and head are out of the water at the same time as the whale does a bit of a back arch. After Jess had taken all the pictures she could, we stayed for some minutes more and watched the calf splash around, surrounded by a swarm of dolphins. The whales we see here on the calving grounds are often accompanied by bottlenose dolphins, so we didn't find this to be unusual. The only thing a tad unusual, in fact, was that we hadn't seen much of the mother, and before we departed the beach, Jess and I were hoping for some kind of assurance that the calf hadn't been abandoned. But eventually, as we stood there squinting into the dusky ocean, we saw the spanning back and humungous spout of an adult. Comforted, we returned to our cars.

Despite what people might logically assume, there's no cause for alarm when right whales are this close to the beach. Right whales are commonly seen with mud on their rostrums, and it's possible that this mother and calf were rolling around in the sand and resting in the shallows. The entirety of the main calving area off Georgia and Florida is fairly shallow, and we think shallow waters must be part of what attracts the whales to this particular area. North Atlantic right whales historically stay close to shore, a rather unfortunate characteristic of this particular species that severely endangers them to shipping traffic and fishing gear.

-Kelly

12/29/09

#9 A 'First' We Would Like to Avoid

One of the great aspects of being new to right whale aerial surveys is that everything I am seeing down here is novel for me, especially this early in the season. And so, I was pretty excited to spot the first mother-calf pair of the season in our area during our December 22nd survey. Jess estimated the calf to be about 2 or 3 days old, based on it's size, lack of cyamid coverage and light grey coloration.

The coastal waters of Florida and Georgia are the only known calving grounds for the North Atlantic right whale and as such, this area has been designated as a Critical Habitat Area by NOAA. This area is also busy with vessel traffic, including freighters, tankers, dredges, naval ships and LOTS of recreational boats. Thus, as we circled the mother-calf pair so Jess could photograph the pair for identification purposes, we all kept a look-out on three nearby recreational boats.

Photo Credit: New England Aquarium, Jessica Taylor
Taken under a Scientific Research Permit issued by the National Marine Fisheries Service/NOAA.

Two of these boats were stationary and well beyond the 500 yards mandatory approach limit established by NOAA in 1997, but the third vessel was underway and had changed course a number of times. All attempts to hail this vessel on marine channel 16 to warn them of the nearby whales failed and we watched with increasing dismay as the vessel headed straight toward the pair! Fortunately, the recreational boat did not hit either mother or calf, but they were definitely too close for comfort. NOAA has established several regulations to reduce ship strikes in this area, one of which is that vessels 65 ft or longer must travel at 10 knots or less. However, it is strongly recommended that smaller boats also slow down and post a look out while traveling through the calving grounds. Also, if they monitored VHF Ch 16 then perhaps we could avert future violations of the 500 yard closest approach rule - it sure is a 'first experience' I would prefer never to witness!

-Suzie

12/25/09

#8 Keeping track of Injuries

On December 15th, during one of the few aerial surveys the teams in the southeast US have been able to fly this December (inclement weather has been a problem), observers with Wildlife Trust came across a group of 6 right whales in a SAG off the coast of Georgia. Tricia Naessig, the team leader, noticed one whale with two series of propeller cuts on its left flank (pictured below). She sent images along to the New England Aquarium so that we could both evaluate the severity of the cuts and also match the animal to the catalog to determine when it was last seen.

We have been able to match the animal to #3745, a three year old male. This animal was last seen on February 26, 2009 also in the southeast U.S. The propeller cuts do not appear to be fresh. There are orange cyamids in the wounds and some grey skin in the vicinity of the cuts. Both of these features would take at least a couple of weeks to appear so we have no idea when or where this animal may have been struck.

The nature of the cuts; the distance apart, the length, and the apparent depth, indicate this was not a big vessel. Although it is difficult to pinpoint a propeller diameter and associated vessel length with precision, especially when accurate measurements of the cuts are not possible, there are several studies that have been done to evaluate propeller cuts on marine mammals, especially manatees. Yet, in this case, the best I can do is give an impression of vessel size based on the size of cuts I have seen in the past on right whales from known vessel sizes and the studies done by others. My impression is that the whale was struck by a twin engine vessel resulting in the two series of cuts and that this vessel was perhaps 30-40 feet long. Although the cuts are not parallel to one another as we would expect, it may be that during the strike, the whale was flexed. Or perhaps the propeller shaft for one of the engines got bent during the strike.

Photo Credit: Wildlife Trust

Vessel strikes by recreational vessels continue to be a problem for right whales. Typically these boats are moving fast and do not see the whale if it is submerged. The whale can't always respond quickly enough to avoid these fast moving vessels. Although these strikes by smaller vessels are not typically fatal, these animals can succumb to infection or effects of stress even months or years down the road. Efforts to educate recreational vessel operators all along the eastern seaboard about operating prudently around whales, especially during right whale migration and in seasonal use areas, continue to be paramount.

12/23/09

#7 NASA training might have been helpful...

The great news is that we are beginning to see more and more North Atlantic right whales here on the calving grounds off of Florida and Georgia. More whales mean more challenges for us researchers; we're now able to put our thorough training and reviewing into practice in the plane and on the ground. In a position with such variegated responsibilities as this one, practice truly does make perfect, and two days ago I learned the hard way that no matter how many times I lift the research camera, fuss with the settings, and practice shooting from the ground, there's no way to prepare for photographing right whales from the air other than actually doing it.

As we survey for whales each day, the main responsibilities in the plane are divided between the two team members who are flying that day. The person next to the right window of the Cessna is responsible for photographing the whales in each sighting, while the person in the left is responsible for assessing the area and ensuring there is no potential vessel traffic heading on course for the whales. Vessel and whale data is recorded both by hand on data sheets, by computer, and verbally into a voice recorder.

Photo Credit: New England Aquarium, Kelly Slivka.
Taken under a Scientific Research Permit issued by the National Marine Fisheries Service/NOAA.

Two days ago I was in the right seat manning the camera when we had our fist Surface Active Group (also known as a SAG) of the season. It was a relatively small group, containing only six individuals. However, the part of the sighting I found truly difficult was not keeping track of the whales, but simply managing to photograph something-- anything-- from 1,000 feet in the air as the plane spins in a circle as if it's winding up to go into orbit, jostled by the blustering, icy winds that shove through the open window, finding the most stable way to prop the 7-pound camera so it faces down toward the water's surface, then fighting the constant centrifugal forces in order to manage 20 seconds of stability so that I can aim, focus, and shoot the whales diving and rolling beneath us in that slight window of time allowed as the plane swings into position over them-- clickclickclick-- before the whales are gone behind the overhanging wing. Though I was, in the end, able to capture identification shots for the individuals in this SAG (one of my shots is above), I certainly left myself a lot of room for personal improvement and have fostered a weighty respect for the more seasoned aerial photographers on the team.

-Kelly

12/18/09

#6 In the hands of Mother Nature

One of the most over-ruling facets of field work is weather. A lot of people could probably go days without looking at a weather forecast-- save making plans for a picnic or a day at the beach. But here in our field house we check the weather incessantly, waiting for every hourly update of the sea conditions in our survey area and obsessing over the swirl of colors on the radar as they fluctuate and surge.

In fact, the first thing our team leader Jess does in the wee hours of the morning is mull over the weather reports-- weather at the airport we depart from, the height of the clouds, visibility, winds, rain, how these factors change the farther we get out to sea and how they change north and south along the coast. The main reason we are preoccupied by weather is that it can affect our ability to sight whales from the plane. As I displayed two posts ago, whales can be hard to spot when the sea is glassy as a lake; with increasing winds and waves, our ability to spot whales from one thousand feet in the air decreases enormously, so flying would be futile.

We have been having a rough December as of yet, hampered by strong Northeasterly winds punctuated by bouts of enveloping fog (exemplified in the accompanying photographs taken off Fernandina Beach). It's certainly a unique and atavistic situation to be thus ruled by the whims of winter weather patterns. Hopefully our fortunes will change here very shortly so that we can get out and better protect area right whales, undoubtedly gathering at this moment in the local waters, rain or shine.

-Kelly

12/16/09

#5 Meet a Researcher: Jessica Taylor

Marine science has always been a completely fascinating field to me. Growing up, I was impressed by everything to do with the ocean, from mysterious pictures of deep-water fish with strange biolumiscent fishing lures, to the sheer size of the great whales. Aboard a whale watch off the coast of Maine, I saw a humpback named Colt, staring up at the passengers onboard with his inquisitive eye, blurring the boundaries between people watching and whale watching. (See an example of this for yourself by watching this video)

I immersed myself in volunteer projects ranging from; scrubbing algae off seal rehabilitation enclosures in Cornwall, UK, to traipsing a beach in Crete, Greece reading tracks in the sand to locate loggerhead nests. Immediately after completing my Bachelors degree I started work as an intern for an expedition company in London, following which I attended a two-month long, marine impact assessment scuba survey in Fiji. The coral cays of the Mamanuca island chain were a world apart from where I learnt to dive in Cornwall. We performed a dive census twice daily, recording every species of fish, invertebrate, coral and algae that we encountered along a 10 metre transect. That was in 2003, and there have been many stepping stones along the way between there and where I am today.

Throughout my travels I have always been drawn to finding work in my field. I found myself diving to clean a shark tank at work in an aquarium of New Zealand's south island, and in Akaroa, NZ, I worked with a PhD student studying Hector's dolphins (pictured). The buffet lifestyle of a marine biologist can take you to some of the world's most breathtaking locations.

Whilst working with researchers studying humpbacks off Western Australia one summer, an opportunity arose to fly aerial surveys for them, and I was familiar with flying in twin engine Skymaster Cessna aircrafts from right whale surveys. Over the next few days I must have seen some of the most remote, awe-inspiring scenery that exists on earth (pictured).

On the return flight over the Kimberly region in the north of Western Australia, we flew over Mitchell Falls, a stunning multi-tiered waterfall.

I have been involved in such a diverse myriad of projects, that it is great to have the consistency of returning to right whale research for my fifth year. Over the years that I have been flying aerial surveys with the New England Aquarium, I have seen a white shark scavenging on a carcass, a right whale surfacing head first repeatedly in between the outstretched flippers of a shocked loggerhead turtle, and even been lucky enough to witness a live birth of a right whale calf.

Work is completely all-consuming in this field, seasons are short, but intense. Survey days are long; the coordination of field work, including data collection and processing is laborious. However, all the hard work and dedication pays off for those moments when you have your breath taken away by the stunning beauty, and intriguing mystery of nature.

-Jess

12/11/09

#4: A Day of Firsts

Wednesday was a big day for me - I saw North Atlantic right whales for the first time! Two juvenile whales (calves of 2008) were rolling, touching and diving for extended periods together; in other words, they were displaying the behavior of a Surface Active Group (SAG). Unfortunately, the other first for me on this survey was not such a happy occasion. We encountered an entangled humpback whale.

I've seen dead whales before and have observed both killer and sperm whales up close predating on fish hauled up on fishing gear in the Gulf of Alaska, but never before have I seen an entangled whale. Despite my emotional turmoil over witnessing such a situation, I had the sense to be impressed by the consummate professionality of our Team Leader, Jess.

Calmly, patiently, and in great detail, she photographed the whale and described the various complicated aspects of the entanglement so that I could relay the information to our Ground Contact, Kelly, who then put the phone tree into motion. This phone tree refers to the various contacts from federal, state and non-profit agencies who decide the appropriate action plan for dealing with an entangled large whale.

In this case, the seas were too rough to attempt immediate disentanglement, or even to try attaching telemetry gear so that the whale could be tracked. But, at least, now all aerial surveys teams are on high alert, and thanks to Jess's awesome photo documentation (shown here), everyone has a good idea of what to expect . We are all hopeful that we'll re-sight this humpback soon so that the disentanglement crew can spring into action and help this magnificent animal!

-Suzie

12/9/09

#3: The Art of Aerial Spotting

During yesterday's aerial survey our team spotted its first North Atlantic right whale of the season--even though the weather has been trying to keep us down, we are finally rolling here on the calving grounds! I'm ecstatic that we will be seeing more and more whales on our surveys now, since long stretches of surveying without whales can be quite mind-numbing. In fact, there's a definite art to spotting whales over miles and miles of textured, churning water.

When looking for something that's not a whitecap or a wave, a buoy or a bird on the ocean's surface, we basically have to train our minds to detect an aberration. As we scan back and forth, we need to find that one patch of white-water that's unlike the others, or that one shadow rolling a tad unusually. It's definitely not simple, and it takes a lot of practice. I think a good comparison would be looking at a pointillist painting, like Georges Seurat's A Sunday on La Grande Jatte and trying to find the one dot that doesn't belong. The photo above is an example of just how subtle a right whale at the sea surface can be.

-Kelly

12/5/09

#2: Right Whale Festival

Unfortunately, the weather prevented us from flying a survey today. On the bright side, those of us scheduled to fly were able to check out the Right Whale Festival in Jacksonville Beach, Florida instead.

Monica, Kelly, and Kara manned the New England Aquarium's booth and did a great job providing information about right whales to festival-goers. Despite the rain and biting wind early in the day, people came out to show their support and interest in right whale issues. Overall the festival appeared to be a success!

-Karen

12/2/09

#1: Getting Down to Business!

Each winter the New England Aquarium is part of a comprehensive aerial survey effort in the Southeastern United States called the Early Warning System (EWS). The EWS was developed in December 1993 to provide near real- time locations of critically endangered North Atlantic right whales to the Army Corps of Engineers (ACOE) so that seasonal dredging operations did not interfere with these vulnerable whales. (Read more about this in previous posts here and here.)

The effort, communication, technology and awareness of the EWS have evolved greatly over the past seventeen years, yet the primary goal remains the same. Today the EWS is an extremely large network which attempts to prevent ship collisions with right whales by providing real-time detection to commercial mariners, U. S. Navy, ACOE, US Coast Guard, harbor pilots, port authorities and recreational boaters. (Learn more about the busy ports in the area from this post.)

The EWS consists of three survey teams working from north to south along roughly 100 miles of coastline (see map). These teams work every day it's possible to fly, even during the holidays, and consist of many dedicated observers from Wildlife Trust, the Florida Conservation Commission, and the New England Aquarium.

With many thanks to the team members, funding agencies, experts and all those that have contributed to and enforced this extraordinary operation, another North Atlantic right whale season is now underway on the southeastern calving grounds.

Since mid- to late-November, researchers have been gathering down south and setting up shop along the coast, preparing to meet the arriving right whales. North Atlantic right whales, a still very mysterious species, can generally be found feeding in Cape Cod Bay and the Great South Channel in spring. Come warm summer weather, many of the whales move up to the Bay of Fundy, between Maine and Nova Scotia, and continue to take in massive amounts of food before moving back down the coast for the wintertime. While some whales return to Massachusetts waters for their falls and winters, a sizable amount come down to the warmer waters off of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida before and/or after feeding near Massachusetts. The large majority of the whales we do see down in the southeast are pregnant females and females with brand new calves, so this close-to-shore southeastern area is known as the main calving ground for the species; in fact, it's the only calving ground for North Atlantic right whales known at all! (You can claim a plot of ocean in this area and pledge to protect it by living blue on the Aquarium's Live Blue Initiative.) As this species of whale continues to teeter near the edge of extinction, the EWS effort to survey the calving grounds is crucial, and the project draws observers and researchers from all over the world.

But getting down to business for the 2009-2010 season in particular--all the teams had arrived by the last days in November and met for the usual team meeting on November 29 in order to discuss new changes to research, particularly with photo identification (play a flash game explaining this here). As it turns out, EWS aerial surveys provide an excellent platform for researching right whales and keeping track of this precarious population, so as observers we collect data about the whales while reporting to concerned ships about the whales' locations. This makes the importance of our surveys twofold.

On November 30 many of the observers met in St. Augustine Florida to get some training on disentangling right whales from fishing gear that the whales tend to get wrapped up in, just in case any of us are needed in an emergency entanglement circumstance. (If you're wondering what on Earth this entanglement business is about, stay posted! There will surely be a better description later in the season. You can also read about past entanglements in these previous posts.) Anyone not involved in the disentanglement training was finishing up the preparation for flight--testing radios, wiring the survey airplanes, and solidifying the EWS network.

Starting mid-November, a few North Atlantic right whales were seen heading down the coast by researchers further north, which is a really early arrival. Special buoys planted in the ocean around the calving grounds have also been picking up right whale calls under water, meaning that whales have been in the immediate area. Because of these good signs, we were all ready to get going right away on December 1, the official first day of the seasonal surveys.

Unfortunately, with the first of the month came an onslaught of bad weather, and the seas were too rough to make surveys functional. Instead of surveying on December 1, we did some in-flight training, and I had my first ride in our small but sturdy survey plane, a Cessna Skymaster 337 (at left). The coast was beautiful from the airplane, and we tested our radios and took some practice photographs of marker buoys in order to cinch the routine for photographing whales. (More about photo-identification of right whales in many of the next posts!)

Most importantly, we got to know the New England Aquarium team mascot: Louie, the adorable pup of Ken, one of our pilots.

Weather was less than ideal again today, so we hunkered down at the house and went over a computer program named DIGITS, which we'll be using all season to upload our photographs and data about the right whales we see in order to help the Aquarium maintain the North Atlantic Right Whale Catalog. Luckily, the weather looks better tomorrow, so we should be able to get in the air and finally see which right whales, if any, are hanging around the seas just off the southeastern coast.

Keep checking the blog in the next few days for more information as the season gets underway. We will have multiple updates per week about new mothers and calves and all the right whale action happening in the EWS area! Who knows: we might break last year's all-time calf record of 39 newborns and see many of those young whales return nice and healthy to the south.

One last thing ... If you happen to be local to the Jacksonville area, be sure to come explore this year's Right Whale Festival at Jacksonville Beach! The Festival is this Saturday, December 5, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

-Kelly

11/23/09

#23: Aerial Survey Starting Soon

We are getting ready to begin our aerial survey field season in the southeastern United States. On December 1, we will be 1000 feet in the air scanning the endless waters off Georgia and Florida's coastline for right whales, especially mothers with their newborn calves! There have already been reports of right whales off the coast of South Carolina by the Wildlife Trust aerial survey team! To follow the whales down to the warmer waters off the east coast U.S. click on the link to our Aerial Survey Blog and don't forget to bookmark! It's sure to be an exciting season!

-Jonathan

10/7/09

#22: End of the Season

Our field season in the Bay of Fundy has ended. It was a demanding and exciting season this year with all sorts of media coverage, interesting whales, and unusual whale distributions. We had a few of different research vessels on the water this season and were able to cover a large area of the Bay of Fundy and Roseway Basin.

The r/v Nereid went out 23 times and the r/v Callisto was able to get out 7 times, both surveying the Bay of Fundy. During the last week of August into early September, a few members of our team set out to Novia Scotia for a 10-day long survey of the Roseway Basin Area To Be Avoided. The last time a thorough population survey was conducted in Roseway Basin was in 2006. We were able to document 20 of the 39 mother and calf pairs this season and so far we have identified 141 right whales in the Bay of Fundy and approximately 40 more in Roseway Basin. These numbers will be sure to grow once the data is fully processed.

In August, a story ran on the front page of the Bangor Daily News about our research. The story ran on their website with a great video displaying a typical day as a right whale researcher. In September, Chris Corday from the Canadian Broadcasting Center came to video interview our team for a spot on the CBC's The National.

We saw a number of interesting whales as well, one in particular, Pico (#3270), who swam to the Azores last January. It is usual to have a right whale sighting in the eastern Atlantic and we were all curious if we would see Pico again. Pico is an example of how right whales can and do travel outside of their typical migration route along the east coast of the United States and Canada. Other interesting whales sighted in the bay were Ruffian (#3530), who, last January, sustained injuries all over his head and body on his migration to the southeast habitat, and Calvin (#2223) and her calf who were sighted once in the calving grounds this past winter and not again until September.

Right whale distributions were noticeably different this year compared to previous years. Right whales sightings near the wolves (a chain of islands miles north of the usual habitat) we last recorded during the early 1980s. That's 30 years ago!

The weather turned foul during the last week of the field season so we packed up the research station and headed south back to Boston. We are always sad to leave the bay knowing that whales are still in the bay, but this year find some closure knowing that foul weather continues to haunt the bay.

Now back in Boston, we have to prepare for the Biennial Marine Mammal Conference in Quebec City, the North Atlantic Right Whale Consortium and the Southeast field season in Fernandina Beach, FL starting December 1st.

-Jonathan

9/28/09

#21: A Season of Unusual Sightings

As our season is winding down, we've been thinking about some of the unusual sightings we've had over the past couple months. We've mentioned some of them in earlier blog entries, like the unprecedented number of right whales off The Wolves (the island chain many miles north of the usual habitat) and the crazy cloud we saw in early September. But there have been other things that have caught our attention and made us wonder: What's going on this year?

One of the avian species we see every year are puffins, the cute football shaped black birds with the colorful striped beaks. Typically we only see four or five on any given day, but this year was a different story. Nearly every day we were out this season we had lots of puffins--puffins alone, in pairs or trios and occasionally in flocks of 8-12! And in late August we even had a rare sighting of an albino puffin! Why all the puffins? We have no idea, but we've certainly had fun watching them.

There were two other bird species that seemed much more prevalent this year than in the past: Northern Fulmars and Jaegers. Fulmars are usually found offshore, so the number of sightings we've had is surprising. What's great about fulmars is that they always seem a little curious about us. They literally turn their heads to check us out as they fly by.

Jaegers are aggressive seabirds that engage in kleptoparasitism--harassing other birds to force them to drop food they are carrying. As with puffins and fulmars, we've had a bumper crop this year. Find out more about all three of these interesting seabirds here.

The Bay was hopping with Bluefin tuna, especially in September. It's always exciting to see schools of these magnificent fish leaping out of the water as they pursue their unlucky prey.

In addition to the birds in the Bay of Fundy, we've also had an influx of humpback whales in areas that are usually the exclusive domain of right whales. It's not that humpbacks aren't seen in the Bay, they are, but they tend to aggregate further to the south and east. In years past, a big humpback count would be three in one day, but on a recent trip we counted 15! One of the humpbacks spent several minutes flippering, i.e. slapping it's long (12')pectoral fin against the water. Quite a bizarre sight when you're used to the black , paddle-shaped and comparatively stubby flippers of the right whale. The latin name for humpbacks is Megaptera novaeangliae, which means "big-winged New Englander"... it's easy to see why it got that name!

All of these species are not uncommon in the Bay of Fundy, but what has been interesting is the number of them. Why are so many humpbacks, fulmars, jaegers, puffins and tuna in the Bay this year? And could there be any correlation with the right whales' unusual northerly distribution, not seen in 30 years? Nature, as always, holds puzzles that we have yet to figure out.

To see more photos of unusual species we saw this season click here.

-Marilyn

Photo Captions:

1) An albino puffin in the Bay of Fundy

2) A fulmar checks us out as it flies by the boat

3) A parasitic jaeger looking for trouble

4) T he back half of a leaping tuna

5) A humpback whale waves it's long flipper in the air

9/27/09

#20: Other Species Seen on Roseway Basin

In addition to North Atlantic right whales, we were lucky to see several other species of marine mammals, fish and birds during our trip to Roseway Basin. Following is a short list of some of the different species of animals seen:

Fin whale, Sei whale, Humpback whale, Minke whale, Pilot whale, Killer whale, Common dolphin, White-sided dolphin, Harbor porpoise, Mola-mola (Sunfish), Basking shark, Blue shark, Tuna, Northern Gannet, Greater shearwater, Wilson storm petrel, Leech's storm petrel, Northern fulmar, Pomerine jaeger, Parasitic jaeger, Black backed gull, Herring gull, Atlantic puffin, Phalaropes.

From left: mola mola (sunfish) and common dolphin

Here's a slideshow of more images:

Check out a similar slide show from this season's Aerial survey blog here.

-Yan

9/25/09

#19: The Right Whale Team on CBC News

North Atlantic right whales were a feature story on the CBC this week. The story features some great footage of whales in Surface Active Groups and diving. There are also some interview clips of our Canadian team members, Moira and Yan.

Click here to watch the news story.

9/22/09

#18: A day on Roseway Basin

Our days on Roseway were long and action packed! Here's a log of a full day on Roseway Basin, from a Wednesday evening to a Thursday evening.

Wednesday, Sept 2

10-11:30 p.m.: On the night watch. Each crew member takes a 1.5 hour watch each night. At night we are drifting (not under power) and so I need to watch the radar to ensure that we don't drift near any other vessels. I watch the radar screen and watch out the wheelhouse windows for lights on the horizon. If a vessel comes within 3 miles of us, I will wake the Captain and he will decide whether or not we need to maneuver around the other vessel. My watch tonight is uneventful and I wake Jon at 11:30 p.m. to take the next shift. I'm glad to head to my bunk for a good night's rest!

Thursday, Sept 3

5:30 a.m.: Moe (who had the last night watch) wakes up the rest of the crew so we can get dressed, eat breakfast and be on watch by 6 a.m. Everyone is a bit tired since this is our third day at sea.

6 a.m.: Moe and I take the first watch and head to the top of the wheelhouse to look for whales. It's a beautiful day for surveying! The water is very calm and there's good visibility, so spotting blows should be easy today. It's going to be a busy day.....it's only 6:45 a.m. and we've already found our first whale!

11 a.m.: The whales are pretty spread out today. We've surveyed for several hours and found six right whales. For many of these whales, this is the first time we've seen them during our survey of Roseway Basin. Over the past two days we covered the eastern to mid sections of the Roseway Basin Area to be Avoided (ATBA) and found a heavy concentration of whales. (Read Moe's full post about the ATBA here.) Today, we are surveying the western section of the ATBA so we can get a more complete picture of what part is being utilized.

12:20 p.m.: I'm famished! We're taking a quick lunch break to revitalize the team!

1:16 p.m.: Success! We just obtained a biopsy sample from right whale #1036! (You can search for this individual's sighting history and photos on the North Atlantic Right Whale Catalog.) This whale was first seen in Cape Cod Bay in 1970 and has never been biopsied before. #1036 has a very cryptic sighting history. After it's first sighting, it disappeared for 12 years. It was finally found again in 1982 in Roseway Basin. This whale seems to prefer offshore habitats as it is mostly seen in the Great South Channel (east of Cape Cod) and in Roseway Basin. This biopsy sample will determine whether #1036 is male or female and how it is related to others in the population!

3:30 p.m.: After photographing a single right whale, I spotted a tall dorsal fin out of the corner of my eye. Seconds later Moe called up on the radio; "Did you guys see an orca?" We all immediately went on high alert to re-sight the lone orca. Sighting an orca in the North Atlantic is a rare occurrence. Most of us had never seen a wild orca before, so we were all very excited about this sighting! We photographed the dorsal fin and the saddle patch just behind the dorsal fin so that researchers can identify the individual.

4:45 p.m.: Throughout our survey today we have seen fin whales, sei whales, common dolphins, harbor porpoise, basking sharks and several ocean sunfish. We've also seen tuna feeding on large schools of fish.

6:30 p.m.: This is the perfect ending of our trip. For the past hour, we've watched a single right whale display head pushing. Head pushing is a behavior in which the whale lifts it's chin out of the water and then forcefully pushes it's chin back down on the water. The force creates a "bow wave" that is very impressive. Yan lowered his hydrophone into the water so we could hear the "gunshots" that accompany this behavior. A "gunshot" is a percussive sound made by right whales. At this point, we don't know what the purpose of this behavior is or how they produce the "gunshot" noise. The whales are constantly reminding us how much more we can learn about them!

7 p.m.: We have packed up our equipment and are heading back to Metaghan, Nova Scotia. Traveling at 9-11 knots, we should arrive around 2 a.m. We're all exhausted, but excited to get back to Lubec and share our findings with the rest of the right whale team!

Photo Caption:
1) Eg#1112 displaying head pushing behavior
2) Sei Whale
3) Yan with biopsy dart
4) Video: Eg#1112 displaying head pushing behavior

-Cyndi

9/21/09

#17: Cool cloud sighting in the Bay of Fundy

Recently the Right Whale Research Team photographed a very unusual cloud during one of the surveys in the Bay of Fundy. Here's a photo:

We sent the photo to an expert and here's what we found out about our amazing sighting.

Caption: Monica and Philip under the "Morning Glory" cloud.

New England Aquarium

12/31/09

#10 Sometimes the Whales Come to Us

12/29/09

#9 A 'First' We Would Like to Avoid

12/25/09

#8 Keeping track of Injuries

12/23/09

#7 NASA training might have been helpful...

12/18/09

#6 In the hands of Mother Nature

12/16/09

#5 Meet a Researcher: Jessica Taylor

12/11/09

#4: A Day of Firsts

12/9/09

#3: The Art of Aerial Spotting

12/5/09

#2: Right Whale Festival

12/2/09

#1: Getting Down to Business!

11/23/09

#23: Aerial Survey Starting Soon

10/7/09

#22: End of the Season

9/28/09

#21: A Season of Unusual Sightings

9/27/09

#20: Other Species Seen on Roseway Basin

9/25/09

#19: The Right Whale Team on CBC News

9/22/09

#18: A day on Roseway Basin

9/21/09

#17: Cool cloud sighting in the Bay of Fundy

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