The Read Lab was part of a successful disentanglement effort led by personnel from the Georgia Department of Natural Resources and the Florida Fish & Wildlife Commission to remove Canadian lobster gear from adult male right whale Argo off Frying Pan Shoals in late January. Read the full story here.
On December 22, the U.S. Senate confirmed Andy’s appointment to the Marine Mammal Commission by unanimous consent. Andy joins his fellow nominee, Dr. Sue Moore, and Commission Chair Dr. Frances Gulland as the three Commissioners. See the news story here.
On July 30, we conducted a successful Controlled Exposure Experiment (CEE) with thirteen satellite-tagged Cuvier’s beaked whales Ziphius cavirostris, off Cape Hatteras. These whales were exposed to Mid-Frequency Active Sonar (MFAS) signals in a highly controlled experimental setting. The MFAS signals were produced by the USS Farragut, a guided missile destroyer based in Norfolk, Virginia. CEEs …
After a long wait for good weather and engine repairs to the R/V Richard T. Barber, we were very excited to kick off the first round of tag deployments for the 2021 Atlantic Behavioral Response Study (BRS). It felt great to be back in the field and we made the most of some wonderful offshore …
On Wednesday, July 16th we completed a successful experimental playback of Mid-Frequency Active Sonar (MFAS) signals to an adult male Cuvier’s beaked whale off Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, as part of the Atlantic Behavioral Response study. This work is designed to improve our understanding of how these acoustically sensitive whales respond to such sounds. Our work …
The first field season of our 2019 Atlantic Behavioral Response Study (BRS) is underway. The primary objective of our field work is to examine the behavioral response of Cuvier’s beaked whales to tactical mid-frequency active sonar (MFAS) signals. We use Controlled Exposure Experiments (CEEs), in which the received levels of these signals are carefully calibrated, …
During the past week we finished deploying satellite tags for the first leg of the 2018 Atlantic Behavioral Response (BRS) study. Then we conducted our first Controlled Exposure Experiment (CEE) with a mid-frequency sonar system deployed from a Navy destroyer. We also conducted another CEE with our scaled sound source, so all together it was …
Despite more unsettled weather, we made significant progress on the Atlantic BRS project this past week. We spent three very long days on the water with two, and sometimes three, boats working about 40 miles from shore. Our field days begin at 4:30 in the morning and often don’t end until after 9:00 PM. On …
Last week we completed the first component of field work in the 2017 Atlantic Behavioral Response Study (ABRS). In this first phase of the field experiment we worked with Daniel Webster of the Cascade Research Collective to deploy satellite-linked dive recorders on nine short-finned pilot whales and five Cuvier’s beaked whales. All of the tagged …
We wrapped up our spring satellite tagging project with Daniel Webster of Cascadia on June 11 and 12. On the first day we had Joel Bell from the Navy along with us and he turned out to be very good luck and an excellent videographer. We had great conditions and managed to deploy six …