Comparing the social signaling behavior of humpback whales in three group types on the Hawaiian breeding grounds using acoustic tags
Humpback whales ( Megaptera novaeangliae ) are exceptionally vocal among baleen whale species. While extensive research has been conducted on humpback whale songs, gaps remain in our understanding of other forms of communication, particularly non-song calls. Here, we compare the spectral features an...
Published in: | Frontiers in Remote Sensing |
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2022
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Online Access: | http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/frsen.2022.910455 https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/frsen.2022.910455/full |
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crfrontiers:10.3389/frsen.2022.910455 2024-02-11T10:02:22+01:00 Comparing the social signaling behavior of humpback whales in three group types on the Hawaiian breeding grounds using acoustic tags Carvalho, Jessica Lammers, Marc O. Indeck, Katherine L. Pack, Adam A. Castilho, Rita 2022 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/frsen.2022.910455 https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/frsen.2022.910455/full unknown Frontiers Media SA https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Frontiers in Remote Sensing volume 3 ISSN 2673-6187 journal-article 2022 crfrontiers https://doi.org/10.3389/frsen.2022.910455 2024-01-26T10:02:41Z Humpback whales ( Megaptera novaeangliae ) are exceptionally vocal among baleen whale species. While extensive research has been conducted on humpback whale songs, gaps remain in our understanding of other forms of communication, particularly non-song calls. Here, we compare the spectral features and temporal parameters of non-song calls recorded from Acousonde TM tagged humpback whales in three commonly observed group types in the breeding grounds: adult dyads ( N = 3), singly escorted mother-calf pairs (N = 4), and competitive groups ( N = 4). Recordings were collected off Maui, Hawai’i during the winter breeding seasons of 2019–2021. Individual calls were identified based on visual and aural inspection of spectrograms using Raven Pro 1.6 software, with a total of 842 calls isolated from 47.6 h of acoustic recordings. Competitive groups produced the most calls (N = 358); however, after adjusting for the differences in recording hours and the number of individuals, the call rate (calls/hour/whale) was not significantly different between group compositions. The temporal parameters and frequency measures of calls did not vary significantly across the groups. However, interesting patterns of calling behavior were observed (e.g., competitive groups had the shortest inter-call intervals and the highest frequency calls, and escorted mother-calf pairs had the longest inter-call intervals) and it is possible the lack of statistical significance could be attributed to the small sample size of tag deployments. This study provides new insights into humpback whale vocal communication behavior in the Hawaiian Islands breeding grounds. Article in Journal/Newspaper baleen whale Humpback Whale Megaptera novaeangliae Frontiers (Publisher) Frontiers in Remote Sensing 3 |
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Humpback whales ( Megaptera novaeangliae ) are exceptionally vocal among baleen whale species. While extensive research has been conducted on humpback whale songs, gaps remain in our understanding of other forms of communication, particularly non-song calls. Here, we compare the spectral features and temporal parameters of non-song calls recorded from Acousonde TM tagged humpback whales in three commonly observed group types in the breeding grounds: adult dyads ( N = 3), singly escorted mother-calf pairs (N = 4), and competitive groups ( N = 4). Recordings were collected off Maui, Hawai’i during the winter breeding seasons of 2019–2021. Individual calls were identified based on visual and aural inspection of spectrograms using Raven Pro 1.6 software, with a total of 842 calls isolated from 47.6 h of acoustic recordings. Competitive groups produced the most calls (N = 358); however, after adjusting for the differences in recording hours and the number of individuals, the call rate (calls/hour/whale) was not significantly different between group compositions. The temporal parameters and frequency measures of calls did not vary significantly across the groups. However, interesting patterns of calling behavior were observed (e.g., competitive groups had the shortest inter-call intervals and the highest frequency calls, and escorted mother-calf pairs had the longest inter-call intervals) and it is possible the lack of statistical significance could be attributed to the small sample size of tag deployments. This study provides new insights into humpback whale vocal communication behavior in the Hawaiian Islands breeding grounds. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Carvalho, Jessica Lammers, Marc O. Indeck, Katherine L. Pack, Adam A. Castilho, Rita |
spellingShingle |
Carvalho, Jessica Lammers, Marc O. Indeck, Katherine L. Pack, Adam A. Castilho, Rita Comparing the social signaling behavior of humpback whales in three group types on the Hawaiian breeding grounds using acoustic tags |
author_facet |
Carvalho, Jessica Lammers, Marc O. Indeck, Katherine L. Pack, Adam A. Castilho, Rita |
author_sort |
Carvalho, Jessica |
title |
Comparing the social signaling behavior of humpback whales in three group types on the Hawaiian breeding grounds using acoustic tags |
title_short |
Comparing the social signaling behavior of humpback whales in three group types on the Hawaiian breeding grounds using acoustic tags |
title_full |
Comparing the social signaling behavior of humpback whales in three group types on the Hawaiian breeding grounds using acoustic tags |
title_fullStr |
Comparing the social signaling behavior of humpback whales in three group types on the Hawaiian breeding grounds using acoustic tags |
title_full_unstemmed |
Comparing the social signaling behavior of humpback whales in three group types on the Hawaiian breeding grounds using acoustic tags |
title_sort |
comparing the social signaling behavior of humpback whales in three group types on the hawaiian breeding grounds using acoustic tags |
publisher |
Frontiers Media SA |
publishDate |
2022 |
url |
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/frsen.2022.910455 https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/frsen.2022.910455/full |
genre |
baleen whale Humpback Whale Megaptera novaeangliae |
genre_facet |
baleen whale Humpback Whale Megaptera novaeangliae |
op_source |
Frontiers in Remote Sensing volume 3 ISSN 2673-6187 |
op_rights |
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.3389/frsen.2022.910455 |
container_title |
Frontiers in Remote Sensing |
container_volume |
3 |
_version_ |
1790598303484739584 |