Wildlife scientist Vanessa Pirotta dives into the magical world of whale song.
Add articles to your saved list and come back to them any time.In the humpback whale world, it’s about being heard rather than seen. None of this “swipe right” business as for modern online romantics. The ocean is a very large place. One way to attract a lady is to belt out a whale banger. In the humpback whale world, it’s the best Barry White or Michael Buble who gets the attention.
First, some whale biology 101. There are two main types of whales, toothed and toothless. Humpback whales are toothless. Toothless whales are also known as baleen whales. Instead of teeth they have long hair-like structures, called baleen plates, hanging from the roof of their mouth. They use the plates to scoop up prey in water then expel the water to trap their food – thinkBeing toothless, they communicate using a low-frequency sound, which travels farther across the sea.
I’ve heard whales singing a sexy song many times. One day in Tonga we could hear whale song through the boat. I bent down to listen through the boat’s floor. Then, I stuck my camera in the water to record it. I couldn’t locate the singer, so I jumped into the water and listened. It was amazing and eerie. The water was so clear that I could see probably 20 or 30 metres but I couldn’t see the whale even though he was close by. Given the sound was constant, he was probably stationary.
As he rose to the surface, very slowly, he kept singing, a trail of bubbles coming from his blowhole. The amazing sound vibrated through my body. People speak of this when sperm whales “click”, or “buzz them”, when they use echolocation near swimmers, and they can feel the vibrations in their body. This was a similar experience with humpback whale song. The whale must have been aware of us, but was unfazed. He sang until he reached the surface to breathe, then, pfffffffffft, he exhaled.
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