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Acoustic Monitoring of Cetaceans 2026

North Pacific

Acoustic Monitoring of Cetaceans 2026

Passive Acoustic Monitoring (PAM) is a powerful method for surveying marine mammal distributions, migratory timings, and behavior patterns. By using deep-ocean hydrophone arrays, researchers capture vocalizations across large oceanic sectors without disrupting animal behavior.

Acoustic arrays

The research network includes deep-sea hydrophone arrays located at key submarine intersections:

  • Point Reyes Escarpment Station: Monitoring deep-water migrations and shipping lane noise overlap.
  • Monterey Canyon Array: Cataloging resident foraging clicks and low-frequency vocalizations.

Key findings

  1. Migratory Shifts: Humpback whale song detections in late winter indicate extended residences on feeding grounds, possibly linked to shifting prey densities.
  2. Noise Masking: Ocean shipping noise below 100 Hz overlaps with blue whale vocal ranges, reducing effective communication distances by up to 60% in heavy traffic corridors.
  3. Daily Cycle: Foraging clicks of odontocetes (toothed whales) peak between 22:00 and 02:00, matching the vertical migration of prey species.

Sources (1)

Every claim in this artifact traces to one of the citations below. Anything that could not be sourced was left out.

  1. [1]
    Acoustic Detection and Classification of Blue and Humpback WhalesAccessed 2026-06-13

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