Beam Reach

Dominique Walk in local paper

Dominique Walk (081) was featured today in her home town newspaper, the Reporter (Greenfield, Massachusetts).  Thanks to her mother, Marie-Francoise Walk, for sending in the clipping pictured here:

Echosounding the west side with J pod

Snug Harbor to Snug Harbor

This morning we learned one of Newton’s laws of motion, that an object in motion stays in motion unless acted upon by an outside force. In this case the object was the wet mooring line and the outside force Lindsay’s face. Still giggling, we headed out of Snug Harbor and surveyed for fish 1/8nm offshore down to Lime Kiln. There we encountered the leader of J pod heading northward. Continuing to collect echosounder data as we began to parallel sub-groups of J pod, we traveled offshore to near Hein Bank before heading back northward to Lime Kiln during a strengthening flood tide. The whales left us around 4pm, so we conducted a bathymetric survey of Lime Kiln. En route to the Sound Watch celebration back at Snug, we collected echosounder data 1/4 mi offshore from Lime Kiln northward and then cooked up rosemary potatoes, steamed broccoli, and a big greek salad.

Double breach video

One of the Beam Reach students, Ryan Spragg, captured this double breach on video today:

It’s a notable clip in part because we were towing 4 hydrophones at the time, one of which is calibrated and sensitive up to about 50kHz. Another student, Lindsay Delp, will use the recorded underwater sounds of the breaches to compute the source levels (after she determines the ranges from the calibrated hydrophone to the percussive sounds).If she succeeds, this could be the first time that the “loudness” of such magnificent breaches is determined. The measurement may help us decide whether breaches (and other percussive behaviors like tail lobs and pectoral fin slaps) have a communicative function or not.

The first spring Beam Reach program is nearing completion. Don’t miss learning about how loud breaches are — along with other interesting recent findings — at the final presentations at Friday Harbor labs this June, 7, 2008. If you can’t make it in person, final papers and talks will be available at the students’ home page — http://beamreach.org/081

Resting on the west side

Garrison Bay to Snug Harbor

After taking Jason to the dock for some well-deserved shore leave we transited to Snug Harbor and welcomed Dr. Robin Kodner.  Emerging into Haro Strait at a very low tide we headed south on advice from Jeanne and were surprised to find about 8 members of J pod (J2 matriline?) resting in a tight group off of False Bay.  We listened to them as they slowly made their way up the west side of San Juan Island, but hear neither click nor calls for more than two hours.  As we passed Kellett Bluff, J1 separated from the group and headed NW across Haro Strait.  We paralleled him and gathered detailed data about how his clicking related to his surfacing and dive times.  The echosounder was on throughout and showed intermittent targets at mid-depths.

Spreading experiments; Js up at Point Roberts

Mackaye Harbor to Garrison Bay

At noon we pumped out at Friday Harbor, refilled propane, and picked up Scott and Ford’s call catalog. Ivan and Jeanne said hello as they headed up towards Point Roberts where J pod was reported about noon. We went up San Juan Channel and discussed whether we should go north to Sucia or west to the west side. Eventually, we decided on Garrison Bay and set a science goal of measuring spreading somewhere in Haro Strait. After passing through Spieden Channel we deployed the array and high frequency hydrophone and recorded four impulsive sounds at a range of about 25-45m. The we transited to Garrison Bay and set anchor, troubleshooting the port prop where we found the saildrive had disengaged. With a sigh of relief, we dined on cheesy potato patties that called for no cheese. Luckily, Ryan and Dominique added plenty along with a green salad and we all went to bed with bellies full of energy for the chilly night.

J pod in the E Strait of Juan de Fuca

Pelican Beach to Mackaye Harbor

Since we had left the southern residents heading north in Rosario the night before, we headed northwards to seek them out again and maybe visit Sucia Island.  Mike got a friendly call telling us they had somehow doubled back, passed us as we slept (with Jason listening to the hydrophone all night), and were actually down south.  We reversed course, came back down Rosario and encountered J pod off the southern end of San Juan Island.  We paralleled them almost half way to Dungeness Spit before leaving them (heading west towards the open Pacific) and seeking safe harbor at Makaye again.

J pod recording in North Rosario Strait

Friday Harbor Labs to Pelican Beach (Cypress Island)

We departed Friday Harbor at approximately 9:30 in the A.M. and headed south through Cattle Pass. Then, on word that J pod were nearing the north end of Rosario Straight, we headed east in hopes of meeting up with them in the process. As the day progressed, we learned more of J pod’s whereabouts and eventually we were able to catch up with them. We started recording at 17:39:30 and captured lots of clicks, calls, and whistles. During our recording, one whale surprised us by suddenly breaching close by. We captured the breach on film and hopefully in the recordings as well. Our evening data-collecting stroll came to a close amidst a sunset and the sound of distant blows as the whales headed north. In short, the day was a productive one despite only recording for about an hour. Hopefully we get some more tomorrow!

Thresher shark and flow noise

Mackaye Harbor to Friday Harbor Labs

Today the whales were spotted near Val’s house in the morning, but they headed up north faster than we could get up to them, eventually heading east at Point Roberts. We did still have an eventful day – we found a stranded shark around False Bay that we think was thresher shark killed by a Transient. Later in the day as we made our way to Friday Harbor Labs we tested another bursting light bulb to calculate source level and tested the Blue Box hydrophone’s flow noise through the water quality. We now our making great speed as we sail fast with clear skies back to FHL!

Serene sounds over Salmon Bank

Snug Harbor to Mackaye Harbor

Today was a terrific day of clear skies and whale sightings! We encountered two leaders from a further southern scattered part of J-Pod off Eagle point around noon time, starting to record at 13:36. We followed them back North to Lime Kiln, only hearing clicks as they traveled fast and far past our hydrophones. We then made our way slowly back around the Southern side of San Juan, encountering a large, spread-out group of whales, where it was hard to keep track of them or catch up to individuals. But our patience paid off, and after all the whale watch boats left we encountered a group of 4-5 whales and heard loud and clear calls, clicks, and whistles! It was a serene moment as we followed them through Salmon bank. We observed breaching, tail and pectoral slaps, spy hops, foraging, and even some social-play mating-like behavior! Confirmed ID’s we’ve made so far are J27, J17, J28, J19, and possibly J30. We stopped recording at 18:45, leaving the whales at the Salmon bank buoy around 18:45, where we hope to catch up with them again tomorrow. Definitely our best day yet!

Dr. Holt guidance and CT profile

Roche Harbor to Snug Harbor

We didn’t catch up to the whales again today, but there were some conflicting reports, probably because some transients were in the area of Kelp Reef and then moved down past Discovery Island. Under that decoy cover it seems that J-pod headed north past Active Pass, probably heading for the Fraser River again. Although we didn’t see whales we did have a very productive science day. Marla finished off her lecture on masking, critical ratios, critical bandwidths, directional effects on masking, and temporary threshold shifts. It is always good to have her expertise available to the students as they are grappling with these complex issues. During the day we managed to deploy the CTD to measure the sound speed profile at various depths. The sound speed was very close to 1480 meters per second at all but the deepest points we went, where it peaked at 1482 meters per second. We dropped Val and Marla off at Snug in the afternoon and spent the rest of our time analyzing data. The students are making good progress on our data from yesterday which is exciting. Keep tuned in for exciting findings….