As Moe mentioned in the previous blog, we experienced quite a bit of rough weather while surveying the Outer Fall area in the Gulf of Maine. "We were able to maintain a watch during the daylight hours (~9 hours) and during all sea conditions which ranged from Beaufort sea state 2 to 8, and most of that was Beaufort 5 to 6; wind speed of 10 to 35+ knots, and wave heights of 2 to 12 feet!" Thankfully, we all came prepared with our anti-nausea medications and saltine crackers, and after a couple of days we were fairly well adjusted to the rolling of the ship.

Yet, those kind of seas don't just provide uncomfortable working conditions—they also make it extremely difficult to find and follow whales: the revealing blow of a whale gets pushed down by strong wind and dissipates more quickly (making it hard to see in the first place, but it also increases the difficulty of identifying the species); blows and body parts can be hidden in the trough of the waves; white water from a surfacing whale can blend in with the crests of the waves. We had our work cut out for us!

We categorized this sea state as "big."

On our first full survey day, our search in a sea state 7 turned up some dolphins and one unidentified large whale—not exactly how you want to start your research cruise. But our second day seemed more promising; around 11am, we sighted a right whale and decided to follow it. Our plan was to see if it would start feeding, at which point the WHOI team would collect samples to see what it was eating. Over the next several hours, the sea state worsened and the travelling whale always seemed to be out of our reach. Even though the whale did not appear to be feeding, the WHOI team conducted four sampling stations along the way so that they would have some data collected near a right whale. Unable to collect useful photographs by the time the sun set, we had to call it a day.

A fun game, like "Where's Waldo?" Can you find the right whale? Hint: look in the center!

With calmer winds on our third day, our sighting conditions were favorable, and we did see many large whales—fin, humpback and sei! We also had some pods of white-sided dolphins cruise by the vessel. Surveying around the area where the gliders had detected right whales, we were surprised that we only saw one the entire day. This whale seemed to be travelling, as it fluked and was not resighted by the team. As we brought our gear inside at the end of the day, we braced ourselves with the knowledge that the forecast was calling for strong winds the next day. Indeed, the Gulf of Maine showed us how feisty it could be on our fourth survey day. As the R/V Endeavor pushed through a sea state 8 and 36+ knots of wind, the observers on the flybridge experienced light rain and even snow! It should not shock the reader to know that we only saw one unidentified large whale and a few dolphins. The following day, things seemed to have simmered down a bit with a sea state 4 to 6, and we were able to sight a few fin whales.

Suddenly our last survey day was upon us, and we needed it to be a good one! With calmer seas, sighting conditions were favorable, and around 10 am the observers spotted two right whales!

Catalog # 3611 makes an appearance. Photo: Tracy Montgomery

These two whales were hanging out with each other and spending time at the surface, so we were finally able to capture photographs that led us to identify who they were! One of the whales, #3803, is a four year-old female that bears healed propeller scars on her body and head. The other whale was #3611, a six year-old of unknown sex.

Catalog #3611 and #3803 at the surface. Photo: Marianna Hagbloom

As we followed these two whales, we noticed a couple of other right whales in the distance, but we were unable to get close to them. After the WHOI team collected some samples, we motored in the direction of a breaching right whale on the horizon. As we neared where it was last sighted, a right whale breached again, and then began lobtailing—lifting the muscular peduncle and fluke out of the water and slapping it against the surface! It was soon joined by a second right whale, and they engaged in a surface active group (SAG) for over one hour! We were again able to photograph these two whales, and identified them as #3620, a six year-old male, and #3460, an eight year-old male. A third right whale fluked nearby, but it didn't join the SAG. As darkness fell upon us, we said farewell to the pair and all the other right whales that we knew were in the area but were unable to document.

Catalog #3460 and #3620 surfacing together. Photo: Marianna Hagbloom

Our trip into the Outer Fall made it clear why this area is so difficult to survey; our right whale sightings shows us that this area is still promising to be an important winter habitat. While we didn't witness any large aggregations, our survey was early in the winter and the water temperature was relatively warm, so perhaps we were in the right place but at the wrong time. Our team is determined to continue to find inventive ways to brave the winter seas in our quest to learn more about this potential mating ground, so hopefully you'll hear about more adventures like these in the future!

-Marianna

There are strange things done in the Gulf of Maine by the light of the December sun
The chasing of whales by damsels three certainly has to be such a one. 

...and so our tail begins. (apologies to Robert Service)

Did we see right whales?... Or should the question have been did we hear right whales?

Our boat based surveys in the winters of  2010 and 2011 to the Jordan Basin area were greatly assisted by sightings of right whales contributed by the Northeast Science Center (NEFSC) right whale aerial survey team. The survey area is huge, and prior knowledge of where right whales had been seen helped us focus our boat surveys to the area with the highest likelihood of seeing right whales in the winter, and hopefully gather evidence to support the hypothesis that this area in the Gulf of Maine is a mating ground for these whales.

Prior to our departure in late November 2012, the NEFSC aerial team had flown the area twice, but not seen any right whales. However, our host for the 2012 survey provided another option. Mark Baumgartner of WHOI (Chief Scientist on this expedition) and his colleague Dave Frantantoni of WHOI used technology to give us the edge we needed to locate right whales acoustically no matter what the sea conditions were—Gliders 08 and 10.


The two autonomous underwater vehicles, equipped with hydrophones and the technology to transmit acoustic data via satellite were our ears to locate right whales. The gliders can be programmed to travel around a certain area, record acoustic data while underwater, and transmit that data back home before continuing on to record more data. This new technology can even be programmed to identify what species of whale it's recorded! The acoustic gliders were deployed on November 12, and before we left the dock we knew they were hearing calls from right whales as well as humbacks, fin and sei whales, and we knew that they were hearing these calls in the area south of Jordan Basin, called Outer Fall.

Click on this link, select glider 10 and you can see why were were full of optimism for right whale sightings.



Our daylight home for the week was the flybridge, located just above the ship's bridge with an eye height above water of 32 to 33 feet, giving us a distance to the horizon of over 6 nm (nautical miles).


Our team of three observers was aided by the oceanographic sampling team and we were able to maintain a watch during the daylight hours (~9 hours) and during all sea conditions which ranged from Beaufort sea state 2-8, and most of that was Beaufort 5-6; wind speed of 10 - 35+ knots, and wave heights of 2 - 12 feet!

Our quarters were very comfortable!

Tracy and Marianna testing out the survival gear!

Our first day at sea was spent with safety briefings and a review of the equipment to be used for oceanographic sampling:


"The Package," as it was fondly called, was a metal cage fitted out with a conductivity, temperature and density profiler, a video plankton recorder and an optical plankton recorder. Mark Baumgartner's team of Nadine Lysiak, Morgan Rubanow, Chris Tremblay and Desray Reeb deployed this instrumentation as well as the echo sounder at 35 different locations during our survey.



Mark Baumgartner showing us how the MOCNESS works: this frame with six nets can be programmed to open and close at different depths to generate a profile of the plankton resource at different depths and was deployed several times in the vicinity of right whales.

Deploying the echo sounder

Deploying the package in sea state 7!

This graph shows the wave heights experienced during the cruise.

The gliders were successfully recovered first thing the last full day on Outer Fall, our best weather day of the cruise.

So - did we see any right whales? Stay tuned yet again as Marianna will reveal our sightings on our next blog...

New England Aquarium right whale researchers Moira Brown, Marianna Hagbloom and Tracy Montgomery are currently out to sea off Jordan Basin braving the freezing temperatures and high winds with the team from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution aboard the Research Vessel Endeavor.


  From left to right, Aquarium right whale researchers Marianna Hagbloom, Moira Brown and Tracy Montgomery


One of our several stormy days on the water, winds topped 35 knots on three days.

Why brave these waters in December? To find the elusive right whale mating ground. If you have been following the team’s blogs over the years, you will know they have made this attempt before. Learn more in these posts: Successful Trip to the Mating Ground and Quest for the Right Whale Mating Ground.


Tracy and Marianna on watch

This year the Researchers have the help of acoustic gliders, which detect right whale calls deep in the ocean. Did they find a right whale? Stay tuned…

I have thought often about what it might be like to be a right whale, but of course I only have my human senses to compare it to. From my perspective, I think about what it might be to spend life mostly in the dark (at night or at depth), having to find enough of the rice-sized copepod plankton to feed a hungry belly, finding a mate that can't be seen, and keeping a one ton newborn calf well-fed and safe.



Clearly right whales are well-adapted to manage all of the above, but what concerns me most are the things they are not adapted to: the chronic noise pollution from the extensive vessel traffic that transits day and night throughout their range which masks their vocalizations and limits their ability to find each other; the fear that must be palpable when one of those vessels gets louder and louder as it unknowingly steams towards them but can't be seen—which way to turn to escape the deadly hull and propeller?; and the panic that must set in when, while searching for food at depth with a mouth wide open, an unseen rope attaching a buoy at the surface to fishing gear at depth becomes caught in the long baleen plates hanging from the roof of the mouth, causing a frantic struggle to get to the surface to breath and to hopefully escape from the heavy gear and constricting ropes.


This latter scenario of entanglement is the focus of a recently published paper by myself and colleagues here at the New England Aquarium. In this paper we reviewed up to 30 years (1980-2009) of photographs for each individual right whale, looked for evidence of entanglement related scarring on all different areas of the body, and noted which animals were witnessed carrying rope likely to be from fishing gear. We determined that 83% of this small population has evidence of at least one entanglement interaction, with some animals experiencing as many as seven entanglement events.

Due to dedicated survey efforts, many whales are sighted and well-photographed from one year to the next, making it possible to notice when new scars appear in a relatively small time frame. Using this well-documented part of the population, we determined that annually, on average, 26% of these animals had obtained new entanglement scars or were carrying gear.

A total of 1,032 unique interactions were documented, resulting in minor to moderate scarring for many right whales, but serious and often fatal entanglements for 86 individuals. And the rate of serious entanglements has increased over the 30 year period.

The entanglement issue remains the most serious conservation concern facing this small population. Expanded fishing effort along the eastern seaboard over the past several decades and the use of stronger ropes and heavier gear is just one more insult we have imposed in the oceanic realm, where it can be all too easy to ignore the impacts. Right whales are in a very real sense a "canary in the coal mine" for understanding what is happening offshore. And we will continue our efforts to work with government and industry to try to find solutions to this complex issue.

If you are interested in reading the recently published paper for more details, it is available for free at the Marine Ecology Progress Series journal.

– Amy Knowlton

2 months
18 team members
1 house
3 survey boats
20 survey days
8 of those survey days aborted or cut short due to wind or fog
0 right whale poop samples
7 known North Atlantic right whale calves born in 2012
1 unique 2012 right whale calf sighted
3 days of mom/calf pair recordings by acoustic team
299 whale calls recorded by acoustic team
20+ dozen eggs eaten by crew
1 bowhead whale
1 orca
2 sperm whales
1 right whale trapped and freed from herring weir
45 unique individual right whales sighted
80 sightings added to the catalog




Compare to BOF 2011 By The Numbers!

-Marianna

We took advantage of fair weather on September 28 to relocate our research vessel to its winter home at James Rich Boatyard in West Tremont, Maine. The good folks there have been taking care of the R/V Nereid since the mid 1990s.  During the off-season, the Nereid will get her usual painting and buffing and as well as a new depth sounder.

The last weekend in Lubec was spent packing up all the research equipment and data. The team headed back to their offices at the Aquarium in Boston on October 1, eager to finish up the season's photo analysis to determine how many individual right whales were accounted for in Fundy. Two of us stayed on for an extra week, hopeful for one more clear day to sneak back out into the Bay to see if there were any lingering right whales. Wednesday, October 3, dawned clear and bright, although with a little more wind than forecast. Amy and Moe borrowed the FRC (Fast Rescue Craft) from the Campobello Whale Rescue Team for one last survey.


Amy (left) and Moe on the 24 foot long FRC Hurricane used by the Campobello Whale Rescue Team to respond to entangled whales in the Bay of Fundy. The sailboat to the left is the Jolly Breeze, a whale watch boat from St. Andrews, NB. Photo: Chris Slay.

Our efforts were rewarded with the sighting of two right whales! The two whales were travelling together, and Amy collected photos before they disappeared from sight.


Near the end of the day, we joined up with the S/V Jolly Breeze and friend Chris Slay on the R/V Jupiter to enjoy some time with a rare species in the Bay of Fundy, an orca!

On September 24th, two eager crews headed into the Bay of Fundy on the R/V Nereid and R/V Callisto. The last survey we attempted was September 21, but we didn't make it very far before turning back due to strong winds and rough seas. As the Nereid motored along our tracklines, we saw many fin whales (our grand total for the day was 12!) and sighted our first right whale, Catalog #2201, just before 11 AM.



An hour and a half later, we came across our second right whale for the day. From a distance, we noticed the color orange on the whale... seeing any color other than black for body, white for cyamids, or brown for mud on a right whale always makes your heart beat a bit faster with concern. As we got closer, our worry was justified- this whale had lots of raw scars on its peduncle and flukes that were covered with orange cyamids. Orange cyamids appear on healthy newborn calves, but if they are copious on an adult, it's likely because the individual is in poor health or is carrying open flesh wounds. The wounds on this whale were consistent with those caused by an entanglement in fishing gear with linear wrapping cuts caused by rope. Presenting a dip in the back right behind the blowholes, it was also visibly thinner than a normal, healthy looking animal.



With choppy seas, it was difficult to get a good look at who this whale could be. Adding to the challenge of matching this whale, this individual had a new scar and heavy cyamid coverage on its head, making the callosity look a little different than normal. This year, our team has been experimenting with a brand new tool: the E-Catalog. The E-Catalog is an exported version of our photo-id database, downloaded as a (very large) file onto a laptop computer that researchers can take with them into the field to help them match individuals in real time. The E-Catalog was programmed by Parallax Consulting, LLC, with funds from NOAA's Northeast Fisheries Science Center, and leverages the programming architecture of DIGITS- our matching and data processing software. This is slightly different than the paper Catalog that we normally take with us on the boat, which allows researchers to look up head codes and see composite drawings of individuals. Now with the E-Catalog, we can still search for individuals by using head codes, but we can also input any other features that can help narrow down the search, such as the size of the lip callosities or any identifying scars on the head, body or flukes. In addition to showing the composite drawing, the database also shows select photographs of the whale (called "primary" images, they are the best representative images available, chosen by our team). The E-Catalog is intended to help speed up the process of matching whales in the field, which is especially important if a whale is entangled, injured or sick. Quick matching is also handy for when we need to know if a biopsy sample needs to be collected from a whale before it swims out of sight!




After trying a few different combinations of head codes with the E-Catalog and comparing the photographs we just took with the primary images, we discovered who this whale was: Catalog #3610. This whale was first observed in January 2006 and is of unknown age. Unfortunately, this is not the first time #3610 has been entangled. First seen carrying gear in September 2006 in the Bay of Fundy, this whale traveled all the way down to the Southeast U.S. where it was seen in January 2007. Much effort was made by several teams to follow the whale, and a disentanglement team made of several members of the Atlantic Large Whale Disentanglement Network worked to make some cuts in the gear and remove as much of it as possible. In April 2007, #3610 was seen again and confirmed to be free of all gear.



The last time #3610 was seen by any observer (that we know of so far) was March 28, 2012 in Massachusetts Bay by the Provincetown Center for Coastal Studies. At that time, the whale did not have any new peduncle scars and was not carrying any fishing gear on its body, so we have some time-frame of when this entanglement occurred.






Due to the match, we were able to tell that this whale needed to be biopsy darted. #3610 was difficult to follow because it didn't stay at the surface long and would sometimes travel east, and sometimes north. Deciding that we didn't want to stress the whale any more than needed, we stuck with it for one last surfacing. Even though we had estimated where it would come up fairly well, we were still too distant to collect a sample, and we allowed the whale to continue on its journey into the Bay.


The good news is that this whale did not appear to be carrying any gear, and now that it is free from whatever was entangling it, it can start to recover. Hopefully, it will be photographed by other research teams over the next several months, which will allow us to study and track the healing process. If we see this individual in the Bay of Fundy next summer, we hope to find it looking fat and with well-healed scars.
We finished out our day with one more right whale sighting around 5 PM- Catalog #3192. The Callisto had a successful day for the season, photographing five individuals. Between the two vessels, we had one duplicate whale, which brought our total to seven unique whales for the day- not a bad tally for our last day on the water of this interesting field season!

-Marianna

Have you ever stood on a shoreline, seen a large ship and wondered where they are departing from and where they are headed?  The Automatic Identification System (AIS) is an automatic tracking system used by certain classes of ships for identifying and determining the location of vessels electronically. Data is exchanged with nearby ships and AIS base stations. AIS information supplements the mariners radar, which continues to be the primary method of collision avoidance for mariners. The carriage requirements for vessels is set by the International Maritime Organization, and they require AIS to be fitted aboard international voyaging ships of 300 gross tonage or more and all passenger ships regardless of size.

AIS has proven to be very useful in marine mammal studies. In the right whale world, AIS tracks were used to see how ships were moving around the Roseway Basin Area to be Avoided, an area off Nova Scotia where right whales tend to aggregate. AIS data is also used along the eastern seaboard of the U.S., where seasonal speed restrictions are in place  to help reduce the risk of ship strike to the whales in the right whale calving ground in the southeast U.S., along their migratory corridor in the mid Atlantic, and in feeding areas around Cape Cod . The data allows researchers and the federal government to see which vessels are going "over the speed-limit" and the ships can be fined based on this evidence. In January 2012, NOAA penalized three vessels who violated this law.





Follow this link to find your location and see what ships are travelling by you! Click on vessel details to learn more about the ship, wind speed, wind direction and air temperature. On our small research vessel Nereid, we have an AIS receiver integrated with our GPS navigation unit and marine radio. When we steer out across the Grand Manan Channel, we can look at the radio screen and determine if there are any large ships operating in our area.  The information provided includes distance to the transmitting vessel, the vessel's heading and speed, and the distance and time to the closest point of approach. This really enhances our safety especially when navigating the Bay of Fundy in fog!

-Moe

Yes, a play on the title of the 2011 movie "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy," to describe a day in the life of a right whale researcher. The first job of the research day is to check the boat (our beloved Nereid is a 29' Dyer), making sure all the fluids are full and the engine is in mechanical order for the day. Then, once the team has loaded and stowed our gear onboard, one of us takes the helm to safely navigate the Nereid out the Lubec Channel, across the Grand Manan Channel and into the Bay of Fundy- a journey of two hours in duration, sometimes in thick fog. During our beeline transit into the Bay, our team is at work and on watch for marine creatures. Once we get into the Bay, we start our tracklines and hopefully encounter right whales, when we can essentially spy on their behavior.


During a survey earlier this month, our research was interrupted by the few words you never want to hear or say on a boat; "I smell something burning!" Monica, our most experienced tinkerer and boat captain, was on watch; I called to her and told her what had been said.  She scrambled back from the bow to troubleshoot the problem. We used our noses to try and isolate the source of the burning smell - was it electrical, rubber, plastic??? Kelsey was at the helm and quickly shut down everything electrical- the engine, computer, radar, GPS navigation unit. As we lifted up the engine hatch, the smell became much stronger.



We narrowed down the source of the smell to either the alternator or the alternator belt. After more tinkering and discussion, we realized that the alternator belt was rubbing up against a bolt on the engine. Luckily for us, the weather was very calm, and although we really didn't want to start taking things apart at sea, we didn't want to lose the rest of our survey day to motoring home early, or worse- the need for a tow.  As Monica says, there are a few breakdowns you don't want to get towed in for, and one of those is for the alternator belt. Always prepared for the worst, we never leave the dock without a variety of extra parts on board. We found our spare alternator belt and consulted our log book for the details of the last time we had to change the belt, back in 2009. Monica is an ace with a wrench, but had not changed the belt on the Nereid before, and I am an amateur at best with a wrench, but had helped with the last belt replacement in 2009.  And so we put our knowledge together while the rest of the crew napped, ate, and/or looked on with amusement admiration. With a little bit of straining, grunting, and mild cursing we managed to remove the old belt, which turned out to be quite worn on closer inspection.



The new belt was fitted into place around the pulleys, making sure that it was well-seated in the grooves. When Kelsey started the engine and revved the Nereid back up to speed, the smell was gone! Everything was working well. We lost just under two hours of survey time due to our breakdown, and although the right whales eluded us for the rest of the day, we were pretty pleased at that our tinkering talents had let us keep sailing for the day. If you want to learn more about alternators and alternator belts try this link, however, always easier in a garage than at sea!

Our days at sea would not be possible without the support of our funding partners. One of the greatest joys of our field season is to share a day at sea with right whales and our donors, who rarely get the opportunity to enjoy time with these whales! On September 14th, we had the distinct pleasure of taking two of our partners from Irving Oil- John Logan (Project Manager) and Carolyn Van der Veen (Public Affairs)- into the Bay of Fundy.

John Logan on the Nereid.

John has been involved in our research, conservation and education efforts for right whales since the partnership began in 1998.
In fact, it was John who first contacted us that year to investigate how we could work together on the issue of reducing the risks of vessel strikes to right whales. The unlikely partnership of biologists and an oil company working together has resulted in a conservation success story for right whales in the Bay of Fundy.

Carolyn Van der Veen on the Nereid.

Carolyn has been furthering the understanding of right whales through several right whale education campaigns online. Check out the "Fluent in Whale" game on Facebook, an inspiring video about our partnership on YouTube, and information about the program on their corporate website. Irving also promotes our Right Whale Research Program at their retail outlets in the Maritimes and New England.





September 14th was a less-than-bluebird day, but our guests were game for adventure on the choppy seas that the wind was stirring up. And wouldn't you know it that we observed the highest number of right whales in one day for the season? We had eight to ten individuals, many of them new for the summer! Some old-timers appeared, like Manta (Catalog #1507), Dollar (#1332), and Meridian (#1403). We also sighted three   younger whales; Catalog #3832, #3890, and #3808 (our first whale of this season).



While being jostled around on the R/V Nereid, Amy Knowlton was able to snag two very valuable photos of Catalog #1331. We don't know when #1331 was born, but we added him to the Catalog in 1981. He was last observed during an aerial survey on November 26, 2011, when his right flank revealed new propeller cuts from an encounter with a small boat. Although we only caught a brief glimpse of #1331, his scars seem to be healing well! This sighting was an appropriate reminder that even though we've made enormous strides in reducing the risk of ship strikes from large vessels, educating mariners who sail on small boats about right whales and how they are vulnerable to encounters is still a relevant and important task.



Before we began our transit back to land, we came across three humpback whales who put on a show for our guests! Have you ever seen two humpbacks breach simultaneously? Then you can imagine the amazement of everyone on the Nereid when all THREE humpbacks breached within less than one second of each other! Difficult to capture, below is a collage of this incredible event:



We had such a rewarding day on the water that there really couldn't have been a better way to say thank you to our funding partners for their willingness to collaborate with us, and for the work they allow us to do. There will be a story on the success of right whale conservation and steps for future efforts in the Saint John Telegraph Journal on September 28th by journalist Jenifer Pritchett and photographer Cindy Wilson, who also braved the elements with us to learn more about right whales in the Bay of Fundy. Keep your eyes peeled for the article if it's distributed in your area!

- Marianna and Moira