Strategies for luring lost whales back to sea
A humpback whale swimming with her calf. Photo Glenn Woodford .
It’s called a “live stranding” when a whale gets stuck in a waterway and can’t find its way out.
The whale becomes disoriented in shallow and unfamiliar waters. At that point, if someone notices the whale, human rescuers may try to help guide the lost whale back into the ocean.
Which technique is used depends on the whale’s species and location. In some cases, rescuers will play recordings of whale songs and calls to the lost whales. Earth & Sky spoke with Brandon Southall, the director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Marine Acoustics Program.
Brandon Southall: There’s two different things you can try to do by playing sounds to the animals. You can get in front of them and try to attract them by playing something you think that they will like. Or you can basically get behind them and try to push them away from somewhere potentially dangerous by playing some sort of sound you think they won’t like.
Attractive sounds for whales are those associated with reproduction, communication, and foraging. But, to push whales forward, rescuers try banging underwater on pipes. Both techniques have had mixed results. One famous example is a humpback whale – nicknamed Humphrey – who had been stranded twice in the San Francisco Bay area and was successfully lured back to the ocean using acoustics.
Our thanks today to NOAA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Voice recordings that lured Humphrey to safety
National Marine Mammal Stranding Network
Our thanks to:
Brandon Southall
Director
NOAA Ocean Acoustics Program
Research Associate, Institute of Marine Sciences
UCSC
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It would have been maybe up to a decade before Humphrey’s plight, but if I remember correctly a whale was lured out to sea, after lack of success with several audio recordings, by the music of Johann Sebastian Bach. Does anybody remember more than I do?
Leonard:
See the link above for voice recordings that led Humphrey to safety.
Eleanor
Looks like Leonard is talking about an earlier whale, before Humphrey. Interesting that someone thought to try classical music …
I wonder if this is true, or an urban legend … about luring a whale back to sea with classical music.