HUMPBACK WHALE SONG
HISTORY OF HUMPBACK WHALE SONG
Humpback whale song has a fascinating history that – at least in modern times – dates back to the 1950s when loud complex calls were recorded by naval listening stations. Some of these recordings from waters off Bermuda were passed on to American biologists Roger and Katherine Payne who set sail in the late 1960s to further investigate. They were able to document that the calls were made by humpback whales and that they were organized into repetitive sequences – or songs. Payne with colleague Scott McVay published the first scientific description of the humpback song in the journal Science in 1971. Ever since these first recordings, researchers have been working to understand the function – or why some species of whales sing long, complex songs.
HAWAII WHALE SONG RESEARCH – EARLY FACTS
Building on this pioneering work in the 1970s and 80s, Dr. Jim Darling was among the first to study humpback whale behavior in Hawaii and breeding grounds in general. Many of these findings are now considered ‘common knowledge’.
For example:
- Singers are often lone adults stationary in the water column in a head down, tail up posture.
- Singers are males.
- Males compete and fight each other over access to estrus females.
- Escorts, the adults which accompany mothers and calves, are males.
Since that time, our dedicated researchers at Whale Trust have continued to unravel the mysteries of humpback whale song, building on this foundation of knowledge to deepen our understanding of humpback whales.
HUMPBACK WHALE SONGS & SOUNDS
Below, you can find examples of humpback whale song recorded off of Maui in 2004, 2013, and 2016.
WHALE SONGS: SINGERS & BEHAVIOR — KEY FINDINGS
Whale Trust’s journey into furthering our understanding of humpback whale behavior began with observing singers and their interactions.
These early studies revealed that singers are often solitary adults, adopting a distinctive head-down, tail-up posture and are always male. Since then, Whale Trust has continued to deepen our understanding of their behavior and interactions.
Below, we present some of the key discoveries that have emerged from Whale Trust’s research on singers and their behavior.
- Singers are males.
- Lone males, not females, join and interact with male singers on the Hawaiian breeding grounds.1
- Neighboring singers may stop singing and become a joiner – that is swim to join a nearby singer.
- Once a joiner approaches a singer, the singing typically stops. Interactions between singers and the male joiner are usually brief and non-agonistic.1,2
- After splitting from one interaction, the ex-singer and ex-joiner often travel to join other (separate) nearby singers to repeat the behavior – this all leading to a network of non-agonistic male-male interactions across the breeding ground.2
- Singers may also stop singing by themselves and travel to join a nearby group which includes a female; a mother and her calf; a mother, calf, and escort; or a surface active group of multiple males chasing a female. Singers and recent joiners sometimes join these female groups as a pair.
- At times, the adult male escort of a mother with her calf or a solo female sings. Whether the singing is directed at the female or other nearby males (as is typical) is a continuing puzzle and research question.
- Males may coordinate and even cooperate to pursue and/or obtain a female on the breeding grounds. For example, neighboring male singers will sometimes join and work together to help control movements around a female during the breeding season.2
- These observations led to the question of whether some males may cooperate as well as compete for access to estrus females and a song hypothesis evolved…
- Humpback whale song organizes males by providing a real time measure of association between individuals, possibly providing a means of reciprocity for mutual assistance in mating. Testing of this hypothesis is underway.2
HUMPBACK WHALE SONGS — KEY FINDINGS
Humpbacks songs, described since the 1970s, are a complex sequence of sounds consisting of several different sound units, arranged as a phrase which is repeated for several minutes as a theme. A song often has 5 or 6 different themes. The composition of the song changes or evolves as it is being sung, yet all the singers in a population tend to sing the same version at any one time.
Observations of singer behavior and interactions led to Whale Trust becoming more involved in song analysis and comparison. Below, you can find some of our key findings from both Whale Trust and collaborative research projects on humpback whale song.
- Playback experiments, where different songs were played back to singers and their reactions measured, indicated singers may be attracted to similar songs but not different songs.3
- Song comparison studies indicate songs of populations closer together are more similar than of populations further apart. For example, songs in Japan and the Philippines (roughly 2,500km apart) are more similar to each other than either are to Hawaii (roughly 6,000 and 8,000km away).4
- Collaborative ocean wide song comparisons suggests that the variable mixing of populations of humpback whales throughout the North Pacific Ocean may be the primary mechanism of song similarity in this ocean.5
- Autonomous acoustic surveys (in partnership with the Jupiter Foundation) detected humpback whale songs in mid-tropical ocean between the traditional breeding areas of Hawaii and Asia, and Hawaii and Mexico. The extent and purpose of this presence is to be determined – but it is consistent with mixing and song similarity across the Pacific.6,7
- Collaborative photo ID comparisons found individual whales (males) may travel between Hawaii and Mexico breeding grounds in the same winter providing an explanation for the similarity of songs between these locations.8
- During the study of songs it was discovered that humpback whales may also use lower frequency sounds (on the edge of and below the range of human hearing), to communicate during the breeding season. These sounds are unrelated to songs. Below are two examples of these “Maui Mystery” sounds.9
When you listen to these sounds you will hear the background ‘noise’ of song and social sounds that are typical of any day in the winter. You will hear (and see on the spectrograph) that the pulse sounds stand apart from these ‘normal’ humpback sounds. You will need high quality headphones to hear the low frequency pulses.
- Darling, J.D. and M. Berube. 2001. Interactions of singing humpback whales with other males. Marine Mammal Science, 17(3): 570-584. (Download PDF)
- Darling, J.D., Jones, M.E., and Nicklin, C.F. 2006. Humpback Whale Songs: Do they organize males on the breeding grounds? Behaviour, 143, 1051-1101. (Download PDF)
- Darling, J.D., Jones, M.E., and Nicklin, C.F. 2012. Humpback whale (Megaptera novaeangliae) singers in Hawaii are attracted to playback of similar song. J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 132 (5). (Download PDF)
- Darling, J.D., Acebes, J.M.V, and Yamaguchi, M. 2014. Similarity yet a range of differences between humpback whale songs recorded in the Philippines, Japan and Hawaii in 2006. Aquat Biol, 21, 93-107. (Download PDF)
- Darling, J.D. 2019. Humpback whale calls detected in tropical ocean basin between known Mexico and Hawaii breeding assemblies. The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America 145, EL534. (Download PDF)
- Darling, J.D., Goodwin, B., Taufmann, A.J., and Taylor, M.G. 2020. Humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) detected by autonomous Wave Glider in tropical deep seas between Hawaii and Western Pacific winter assemblies. Marine Mammal Science. (Download PDF)
- Darling, J.D and Goodwin B. 2023. Further evidence of humpback whale presence in deep tropical ocean during the breeding season: confirmation and extension of acoustic detections between Hawaii and Mexico. Front. Mar. Sci. 10:1223835. (Download PDF)
- Darling, J.D., Audley, K., Cheeseman, T., Goodwin, B., Lyman, E.G., and Urbán, R.J. 2022. Humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) attend both Mexico and Hawaii breeding grounds in the same winter: mixing in the northeast Pacific. Biol. Lett. 18: 20210547. (Download PDF)
- Darling, J.D. 2015. Low frequency, ca. 40 Hz, pulse trains recorded in the humpback whale assembly in Hawaii. 2015. J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 138(5). (Download PDF)
