First whale detected by newly deployed acoustic buoy in New York Bight

New monitoring device has heard fin whales -- the second largest whale species on Earth -- in New York waters

Date: July 28, 2016

Source: Wildlife Conservation Society

A new acoustic buoy recently deployed by scientists from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) and WCS's (Wildlife Conservation Society) New York Aquarium to listen for some of the world's biggest animals in the New York Bight has detected its first whale species, and it's a really big one.

Fixed in position some 22 miles south of Fire Island and fitted with a digital acoustic monitoring instrument, the hi-tech buoy is now operational and has detected the vocalizations of fin whales, enormous marine mammals second in size only to the blue whale, the largest animal species on earth. The first whale detection was made on Monday, July 4th, only 12 days after the buoy was placed in its current position on June 23rd.

Since that time, the buoy has made several fin whale detections; the most recent vocalizations were detected yesterday (July 27th) and today.

"It's incredibly exciting that the buoy is working well and we're hearing whales already," said WHOI's Dr. Mark Baumgartner, co-lead of the joint WCS New York Aquarium-WHOI project, who developed the software used by the acoustic instrument and led the integration of the instrument into the buoy. "Now we can focus on learning when and how often different whales visit the busy waters of the New York Bight over the coming year."

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