Diving patterns of cryptic, deep diving cetaceans

Using tagging, surveys, and towed hydrophones to understand the spatial ecology of whales off the coast of North Carolina

The Marine Mammal Acoustics and Spatial Ecology (MAPS) project was funded by BOEM and led by Drs. Doug Nowacek (Duke) and Ann Pabst (UNCW). The project had four components whose outputs are summarized in the final project report:

  1. Visual and passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) of cetaceans across a section of the Mid-Atlantic Outer Continental Shelf (OCS)
  2. Improvements to opensource tag visualization software
  3. Streamlining of citizen science data-gathering technologies, and
  4. Communication and outreach efforts

You can find a brief explainer on the research efforts here:

This work was conducted on R/V Song of the Whale (SOTW) during the winter and spring of 2019. I served as a visual observer on 2 two-week legs of the project aboard SOTW.

Dr. Leigh Hickmott gives instructions on the use of digital acoustic recording tags (DTAGs).