About This Project
False killer whales are being by-caught by tuna fishing boats. They sometimes get injured on the baited hooks underwater . Our initial work shows that false killer whales can 'see' the hooks underwater with their biosonar. We want to find out how far away they can detect the hooks, whether some hooks are 'brighter' than others, whether we can make them brighter, whether the whales can detect bright hooks better and whether we can work with fishers to greatly reduce the deaths of whales.
Ask the Scientists
Join The DiscussionWhat is the context of this research?
Tuna fisherman do not like to catch whales and people that love whales certainly do not like them being caught on large hooks and drowned. We are seeking a solution to assist in saving false killer whales. The National Marine Fisheries Service recognizes this as a problem and has established a 'take reduction team' to try to figure out ways to reduce whale deaths. So far the most effective thing to do is to stop fishing in territorial waters. That does not protect most of the whales in the ocean. False killer whales have outstanding biosonar. Our first studies show they can detect hooks with that echolocation. We want to know more. We want to assist the whales in detecting fishing hooks so that they will not be caught on the longlines.
What is the significance of this project?
Biosonar experiments are conducted with trained whales. One must ask the whale, "Do you see a hook?" using only biosonar, not vision. The experimenter must have 'trials' in which hooks are both present and absent to make sure the whale is answering correctly. There is a false killer whale available to the Hawaii Institute of Marine Biology, that has been trained and answers these questions reliably . Hooks can now be placed farther and farther away from the whale until she no longer can detect them in order to determine her detection range. Various types of hooks can then be presented and compared to see which ones are the best for detectability and can be seen the farthest and buried within the bait fish. Dolphins detect fish buried over a foot into mud.
What are the goals of the project?
The goals of this project are to (1) establish the range at which the false killer whale can echolocate a bare tuna fish hook, (2) obtain a variety of current types of fish hooks and compare the ranges at which the whale can detect them with biosonar, (3) examine and develop a variety of material coatings to 'brighten' the fishhooks to make them more acoustically visible to false killer whale biosonar and then compare those to the hooks previously tested, (4) present these data at scientific meeting and journals, (5) use the findings of this work to write larger proposals to complete this effort and to propose applications to working with wild whales and fishing boats
Budget
Our first experiment with Kina, the false killer whale, showed she detects a fishing hook. Now we need to see if she detects other hooks better, how well she detects the hooks inside the bait fish, if some other hooks can be developed (by adding textures and coatings) to make them brighter and more detectable and whether that increases the distance to which Kina can detect the fish hooks. It is very logical that whales are very selective about what they eat. If we can make bright biosonar anomalies within the bait fish by putting bright hooks in the bait fish we believe we can reduce the number of wild false killer whales caught by long line tuna fishermen. If these initial experiments with a whale in a laboratory are successful, we can apply for future larger grants to test these hypotheses on wild false killer whales.
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Meet the Team
Affiliates
Affiliates
Team Bio
We study whale and dolphin hearing and echolocation wherever we can. We have studied harbor porpoises in Holland, beluga whales in Europe, polar bears in Sweden, bottlenose dolphins, spinner dolphins, beaked whales in Hawaii and the hearing of dolphins damaged by dynamite fishing in the Philippines. We also study the hearing of whales and dolphins that strand on the beach to see what made them strand.
Paul E. Nachtigall
Paul Nachtigall is the director and research professor of the Marine Mammal Research Program of the Hawaii Institute of Marine Biology. He is a former president of the Society for Marine Mammalogy, an honorary member of the European Association for Aquatic Mammals, a former editor of the Journal Aquatic Mammals and a fellow in the Acoustical Society of America. He has published over 150 peer-reviewed scientific publications and edited 6 scholarly books including two classic volumes on animal echolocation.
Aude Pacini
Aude is a researcher at the Hawaii Institute of Marine Biology. She is originally from France and has obtained her PhD at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. She has worked at several parks and aquariums before studying the hearing and echolocation abilities of dolphins and whales. A lot of her work has focused on understanding the impact of underwater sound on marine life and she has recently worked with the Philippine Stranding Network to test the hearing of dolphins exposed to dynamite fishing. She is currently teaching Marine Mammal Science at the University of Hawaii.
Additional Information
This is a unique proposal. We have been working with Kina the false killer whale for many years. She is a wonderful animal and a fantastic echolocator. Her most recent work also shows that she can change her hearing levels by dampening her hearing and plugging her ears internally if she is warned that a loud sound is coming. This work was reported in the New York Times and many articles written in the Journal of Experimental Biology. When she was younger, she could tell the difference betwen objects that differ by the thickness of a hair ! She has been the main subject for 5 doctoral dissertations at the University of Hawaii and is currently housed at Sea Life Park Hawaii who has agreed to this work.
Project Backers
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