Parks Susan E, Urazghildiiev Ildar, Clark Christopher W
Applied Research Laboratory, The Pennsylvania State University, State College, Pennsylvania 16804, USA.
J Acoust Soc Am. 2009 Feb;125(2):1230-9. doi: 10.1121/1.3050282.
The North Atlantic right whale inhabits the coastal waters off the east coasts of the United States and Canada, areas characterized by high levels of shipping and fishing activities. Acoustic communication plays an important role in the social behavior of these whales and increases in low-frequency noise may be leading to changes in their calling behavior. This study characterizes the ambient noise levels, including both natural and anthropogenic sources, and right whale upcall parameters in three right whale habitat areas. Continuous recordings were made seasonally using autonomous bottom-mounted recorders in the Bay of Fundy, Canada (2004, 2005), Cape Cod Bay, (2005, 2006), and off the coast of Georgia (2004-2005, 2006-2007). Consistent interannual trends in noise parameters were found for each habitat area, with both the band level and spectrum level measurements higher in the Bay of Fundy than in the other areas. Measured call parameters varied between habitats and between years within the same habitat area, indicating that habitat area and noise levels alone are not sufficient to predict variability in call parameters. These results suggest that right whales may be responding to the peak frequency of noise, rather than the absolute noise level in their environment.
北大西洋露脊鲸栖息在美国和加拿大东海岸的沿海水域，这些区域航运和捕鱼活动频繁。声学通讯在这些鲸鱼的社会行为中起着重要作用，低频噪音的增加可能导致它们的呼叫行为发生变化。本研究描述了三个露脊鲸栖息地的环境噪音水平，包括自然和人为来源，以及露脊鲸的向上呼叫参数。在加拿大芬迪湾（2004年、2005年）、科德角湾（2005年、2006年）和佐治亚州海岸外（2004 - 2005年、2006 - 2007年），使用自主式海底记录仪按季节进行连续记录。在每个栖息地都发现了噪音参数的一致年际趋势，芬迪湾的频段水平和频谱水平测量值均高于其他区域。测量的呼叫参数在不同栖息地以及同一栖息地内的不同年份之间存在差异，这表明仅栖息地面积和噪音水平不足以预测呼叫参数的变异性。这些结果表明，露脊鲸可能对噪音的峰值频率做出反应，而不是对其环境中的绝对噪音水平做出反应。
