A whale alarm fails to deter migrating humpback whales:An empirical test
Cetacean entanglements in fishing gear cost governments, fishermen and stakeholders millions of dollars a year, and often result in serious injury or death of the entangled animals. Entanglements have been implicated in preventing the recovery of some large whale populations. Acoustic deterrents on...
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ftmacquarieunicr:oai:https://researchers.mq.edu.au:publications/456b8006-3030-4368-918b-d783bac96131 2024-06-09T07:46:37+00:00 A whale alarm fails to deter migrating humpback whales:An empirical test Harcourt, Robert Pirotta, Vanessa Heller, Gillian Peddemors, Victor Slip, David 2014 https://researchers.mq.edu.au/en/publications/456b8006-3030-4368-918b-d783bac96131 https://doi.org/10.3354/esr00614 http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84914182822&partnerID=8YFLogxK eng eng info:eu-repo/semantics/closedAccess Harcourt , R , Pirotta , V , Heller , G , Peddemors , V & Slip , D 2014 , ' A whale alarm fails to deter migrating humpback whales : An empirical test ' , Endangered Species Research , vol. 25 , no. 1 , pp. 35-42 . https://doi.org/10.3354/esr00614 article 2014 ftmacquarieunicr https://doi.org/10.3354/esr00614 2024-05-16T14:21:49Z Cetacean entanglements in fishing gear cost governments, fishermen and stakeholders millions of dollars a year, and often result in serious injury or death of the entangled animals. Entanglements have been implicated in preventing the recovery of some large whale populations. Acoustic deterrents on fishing nets are widely used to reduce incidental captures of dolphins and porpoises, but there is little evidence as to whether they effectively deter large whales. We tested whether a low-frequency whale alarm (3 kHz Whale Pinger ® , 135 ± 5 db, 5 s emission interval and 400 ms emission duration) deterred Southern Hemisphere humpback whales Megaptera novaeangliae from approaching a potential source of entanglement. Northerly migrating humpback whale pods were tracked by an observer blind to alarm status (on/off) as they passed an alarm moored in the centre of the peak migration path. Of 137 pods tracked, 82 (60%) passed within the assumed detectable range (500 m) of the alarm, 51/78 (65%) when it was on and 31/59 (52%) when it was off(p = 0.18). There was no discernible response to the alarm. Whale pods did not differ in directionality, course heading or dive duration when within detectable range of the alarm, whether it was on or off, and a number of pods passed directly over the alarm while it was operational. This suggests that single alarms as currently configured and attached to a trap or pot line are unlikely to effectively deter humpback whales from approaching potential hazards, at least during their northerly migration phase. Article in Journal/Newspaper Humpback Whale Megaptera novaeangliae Macquarie University Research Portal Endangered Species Research 25 1 35 42 |
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Open Polar |
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Macquarie University Research Portal |
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ftmacquarieunicr |
language |
English |
description |
Cetacean entanglements in fishing gear cost governments, fishermen and stakeholders millions of dollars a year, and often result in serious injury or death of the entangled animals. Entanglements have been implicated in preventing the recovery of some large whale populations. Acoustic deterrents on fishing nets are widely used to reduce incidental captures of dolphins and porpoises, but there is little evidence as to whether they effectively deter large whales. We tested whether a low-frequency whale alarm (3 kHz Whale Pinger ® , 135 ± 5 db, 5 s emission interval and 400 ms emission duration) deterred Southern Hemisphere humpback whales Megaptera novaeangliae from approaching a potential source of entanglement. Northerly migrating humpback whale pods were tracked by an observer blind to alarm status (on/off) as they passed an alarm moored in the centre of the peak migration path. Of 137 pods tracked, 82 (60%) passed within the assumed detectable range (500 m) of the alarm, 51/78 (65%) when it was on and 31/59 (52%) when it was off(p = 0.18). There was no discernible response to the alarm. Whale pods did not differ in directionality, course heading or dive duration when within detectable range of the alarm, whether it was on or off, and a number of pods passed directly over the alarm while it was operational. This suggests that single alarms as currently configured and attached to a trap or pot line are unlikely to effectively deter humpback whales from approaching potential hazards, at least during their northerly migration phase. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Harcourt, Robert Pirotta, Vanessa Heller, Gillian Peddemors, Victor Slip, David |
spellingShingle |
Harcourt, Robert Pirotta, Vanessa Heller, Gillian Peddemors, Victor Slip, David A whale alarm fails to deter migrating humpback whales:An empirical test |
author_facet |
Harcourt, Robert Pirotta, Vanessa Heller, Gillian Peddemors, Victor Slip, David |
author_sort |
Harcourt, Robert |
title |
A whale alarm fails to deter migrating humpback whales:An empirical test |
title_short |
A whale alarm fails to deter migrating humpback whales:An empirical test |
title_full |
A whale alarm fails to deter migrating humpback whales:An empirical test |
title_fullStr |
A whale alarm fails to deter migrating humpback whales:An empirical test |
title_full_unstemmed |
A whale alarm fails to deter migrating humpback whales:An empirical test |
title_sort |
whale alarm fails to deter migrating humpback whales:an empirical test |
publishDate |
2014 |
url |
https://researchers.mq.edu.au/en/publications/456b8006-3030-4368-918b-d783bac96131 https://doi.org/10.3354/esr00614 http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84914182822&partnerID=8YFLogxK |
genre |
Humpback Whale Megaptera novaeangliae |
genre_facet |
Humpback Whale Megaptera novaeangliae |
op_source |
Harcourt , R , Pirotta , V , Heller , G , Peddemors , V & Slip , D 2014 , ' A whale alarm fails to deter migrating humpback whales : An empirical test ' , Endangered Species Research , vol. 25 , no. 1 , pp. 35-42 . https://doi.org/10.3354/esr00614 |
op_rights |
info:eu-repo/semantics/closedAccess |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.3354/esr00614 |
container_title |
Endangered Species Research |
container_volume |
25 |
container_issue |
1 |
container_start_page |
35 |
op_container_end_page |
42 |
_version_ |
1801376566115041280 |