New research – acoustic monitoring of the southern Adriatic
The southern Adriatic is an interesting area used by several species of whales and dolphins.
Fin whales, Cuvier’s beaked whales, Risso’s dolphins, bottlenose dolphins, striped dolphins and sperm whales have been recorded in previous research and aerial surveys carried out by the Blue World Institute with its partners.
The deepest parts of the southern Adriatic have also been identified as a particularly important area for Cuvier’s beaked whale, a species especially sensitive to noise.
All whales and dolphins use sound for communication, and some also use it for navigation and hunting prey. Since sound is so important to them, they are particularly sensitive to noise and sounds produced by human activities such as shipping, underwater construction and drilling, and seismic research.
New research
High-frequency Acoustic Recording Package – HARP
In order to collect additional information and determine how whales and dolphins use the southern Adriatic, as well as what types of anthropogenic sounds are present in the area, scientists from the Blue World Institute and the Croatian Natural History Museum, in cooperation with the Department of Marine Biology at Texas A&M University at Galveston, USA, developed a research program on cetaceans and environmental noise in the southern Adriatic using a High-frequency Acoustic Recording Package – HARP.
HARP is an autonomous sound-recording device that enables long-term recording of sounds in the marine environment, developed by scientists from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography.
HARP can continuously record sound across a wide frequency spectrum, enabling long-term acoustic monitoring. Because of its spectral range, HARP can record the vocalizations of baleen whales, which use low-frequency sound, as well as dolphins, which produce clicks at high frequencies.
During its continuous operation, HARP also records noise in the marine environment and sounds such as noise produced by seismic surveys or sonar across a wide area of the sea.
Deployment of the device
After lengthy preparations at the Croatian Natural History Museum, a team of scientists – Assoc. Prof. Ana Širović, PhD (TAMUG), Dr. Draško Holcer (HPM) and Dr. Nikolina Rako Gospić (IPS) – set off on October 19, 2018, with the equipment toward Dubrovnik.
Thanks to cooperation with the Institute for Marine and Coastal Research of the University of Dubrovnik and the project Impact of changes in thermohaline circulation in the eastern Mediterranean on plankton communities in the southern Adriatic: Ecological and genetic approach (AdMedPlan), led by Dr. Mirna Batistić and Dr. Rade Garić, the team boarded the oceanographic vessel Naše more and headed toward the open sea of the southern Adriatic to deploy the HARP.
The team successfully deployed the device at a depth of over 1000 m, where it will continuously record sounds and noise over the next six to seven months.
This is the first deployment of such a device in the Adriatic and the wider eastern Mediterranean region, and it will help us understand the presence of dolphins and whales and the quality of the acoustic environment in the Adriatic.
We eagerly await the first results and the next deployment of the device!