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13 August 1971, Volume 173, Number 3997 



Songs of Humpback Whales 



Humpbacks emit sounds in long, predictable patterns 

 ranging over frequencies audible to humans. 



Roger S. Payne and Scott McVay 



During the quiet age of sail, under 

 conditions of exceptional calm and 

 proximity, whalers were occasionally 

 able to hear the sounds of whales trans- 

 mitted faintly through a wooden hull 

 (/). In this noisy century, the wide- 

 spread use of propeller-driven ships and 

 continuously running shipboard gener- 

 ators has made this a rare occurrence. 

 Not until World War II, when research 

 in sonar and antisubmarine warfare 

 fostered major efforts and facilities for 

 listening underwater, did it become 

 generally known that many species of 

 whales are vocal. At this time the first 

 whale recordings were made. 



Of the 25 or more species of whales 

 that have been recorded, most are 

 Odontocetes (toothed whales). Their 

 sounds fall into three rough categories: 

 short broad-band clicks, longer narrow- 

 band squeals, and complex sounds (2). 

 The complex sounds usually consist of 

 rapidly repeated clicks. Most authors 

 assume that both clicks and complex 

 sounds serve principally for echoloca- 

 tion and that whistles are primarily 

 for communication. However, there is 

 little direct proof of either assumption 

 (2). There seems to be no evidence 

 that the sort of sound-patterning with 

 which this article is concerned occurs 

 among Odontocetes, but there are good 

 reasons to suppose that it might. 



Dr. Payne is assistant professor of physiology 

 and animal behavior at Rockefeller University, 

 New York, New York, and research zoologist. 

 New York Zoological Society. Mr. McVay is an 

 administrator at Princeton University. Princeton, 

 New Jersey. 



Mysticete (baleen whale) sounds are 

 varied and complex, consisting, for the 

 most part, of lower and longer sounds 

 than have yet been recorded from 

 Odontocetes. The fin whale (Balaenop- 

 tera physalus) makes very low moans 

 (at a fundamental frequency around 

 20 hertz) that are monotonously re- 

 peated in a regular pattern {3. 4). To 

 date, the most vocal Mysticete that has 

 been studied is the humpback whale 

 (Megaplera novaeangliae). 



Humpback whales, like sperm whales, 

 are found in all oceans of the world. 

 However, while the sperm whale has 

 been, and remains, the most numerous 

 large cetacean on earth, the humpback 

 has never been very plentiful. The prin- 

 cipal concentration of humpback 

 whales is in the Antarctic Ocean (5), 

 where they have probably never num- 

 bered more. than 34,000 at any one 

 time. However, the intense whaling of 

 the past 40 years has reduced the num- 

 ber of humpbacks there to no more 

 than a few percent of the original 

 numbers. 



The International Whaling Commis- 

 sion has called for full protection of 

 the humpback. Yet, even if this mora- 

 torium is honored, the number of 

 humpbacks in the Southern Hemi- 

 sphere seems dangerously low, perhaps 

 too low to provide the pool of genetic 

 variability needed to survive the next 

 natural or man-made crisis. 



Though they have also been serious- 

 ly overhunted in the Northern Hemi- 

 sphere, small herds of humpbacks ap- 



pear in a few areas during natural 

 periods of concentration (that is, for 

 feeding, migration, delivering young, 

 and the hke). The waters near Bermuda 

 are well known as such an area. Hump- 

 backs are found to the south of Bermu- 

 da in considerable numbers during their 

 annual spring migration from winter 

 breeding grounds in the south to sum- 

 mer feeding grounds in the north (2. 3, 

 6). It is from studies of the herd so- 

 journing in these waters that we have 

 become aware of what we believe to be 

 the humpbacks' most extraordinary fea- 

 ture — they emit a series of surprisingly 

 beautiful sounds, a phenomenon that 

 has not been reported previously in 

 more than a passing way. We describe 

 here one part of the humpbacks' sonic 

 repertoire — a long "song" that recurs 

 in cycles lasting up to 30 minutes and 

 perhaps longer. 



History of Recordlogs 



The first recordings of humpback 

 whales that we know of were obtained 

 in 1952 by Schreiber (7) from a U.S. 

 Navy hydrophone installation on the 

 undervvater slope of Oahu. Hawaii. Al- 

 though Schreiber did not identify the 

 species. Schevill (2) subsequently rec- 

 ognized the sounds recorded by 

 Schreiber as coming from humpbacks. 

 Most of the sounds that we describe 

 here were recorded by Frank Watling- 

 ton of the Palisades Sofar Station at 

 St. David's, Bermuda. Watlington re- 

 corded from a hydrophone installation, 

 similar to Schreiber's, deep in the North 

 Atlantic on the slope of Bermuda. 



Humpback whales may winter near 

 Bermuda as well as pass nearby during 

 their spring migration to northern At- 

 lantic waters (S). The fortunate loca- 

 tion of the broad-band hydrophones 

 used by Watlington made it possible 

 for him to record humpback sounds 

 during spring migrations from 1953 to 

 1964. The broad-band hydrophone 

 from which all of the recordings ana- 

 Ij'zed here were made was in about 700 

 meters of water, about 3 kilometers 

 southeast of the entrance to Castle 



