Bioacoustics is the study of animals with sound. We focus on bioacoustic methods because they are non-invasive and we know killer whales rely on sound to communicate and forage.

At Beam Reach we emphasize passive acoustics -- listening to ambient underwater sound with hydrophones. By towing a 4-hydrophone array behind our silent research vessel we can locate where sounds come from while we move with the orcas. This allows us to attempt to understand the meanings of the sounds that killer whales make.

Passive acoustics also let us ask how human-generated sound affects the killer whales ability to survive. For example, one student studied whether boat noise may be masking the orca communication.

In 2008, we will be exploring acoustic technologies that are active -- they emit sound themselves. Scientific echosounders (or fish finders) can help us assess the abundance of fish that live in orca habitat. And fish tags can reveal how individual fish behave when orcas are around (or not).