Pygmy Blue Whale Diving Behaviour Reflects Song Structure

Abstract

Passive acoustic monitoring is increasingly employed to monitor whales, their population size, habitat usage, and behaviour. However, in the case of the eastern Indian Ocean pygmy blue whale (EIOPB whale), its applicability is limited by our lack of understanding of the behavioural context of sound production. This study explored the context of singing behaviour using a 7.6-day biotelemetry dataset from a single EIOPB whale moving north from 31.5° S to 28.5° S along the Western Australian coast and a simultaneously collected, but separate, acoustic recording. Diving behaviour was classified using an automated classification schema. Singing was identified in the depth, pitch, and fluking time series of the dive profile. The EIOPB whale sang profusely as it migrated, spending more time singing during the day (76.8%) than at night (64.9%), and most during twilight periods (83.3%). The EIOPB whale almost exclusively produced the three-unit (P3) song while milling. It sang the two-unit (P2) song in similar proportions to the P3 song while travelling, except at night when P3 was sung 2.7 times more than P2. A correlation between singing depth, migration duration, and water temperature provides a biological basis to explain depth preferences for sound production, which may contribute to the cause of intra- and inter-annual sound frequency trends.

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