Cetacean seeker

To protect endangered whales, you first have to be able to find them. That’s no small feat given the vastness of the open ocean, but researchers at the University of Victoria and Dalhousie University in Halifax have come up with a lowcost and minimally invasive way to track whale movements: listening for their songs. Research teams have deployed battery-powered underwater drones called Slocum Gliders to patrol little-studied areas on both coasts for whale activity. The data they collect is used to pinpoint where different types of whales are congregating, in turn helping to inform ocean management practices. “These animals are highly migratory, so the only way we can manage their conservation is to manage their habitats,” explains Kimberley Davies, a post-doctoral research fellow at Dalhousie. The Dalhousie team supplies data to the Canadian Navy, which now ceases its training exercises on the continental shelf when whales are detected. The team is hoping to eventually be able to broadcast whale advisories to commercial ships too. “We want to help mitigate harm to the animals as much as we can,” Davies says.

Undersea drones are the newest whale protection tool