Humpback whale song spreads to other whales / beautiful link

[sasha031]

Only the male humpback whales sing their strange and complex songs

Recordings of male humpback whales have shown that their haunting songs spread through the ocean to other whales.
Researchers in Australia listened to hundreds of hours of recordings gathered over more than a decade.
These revealed how a specific song pattern, which originated in Eastern Australia, had passed "like Chinese whispers" to whale populations up to 6,000km away in French Polynesia.
The findings are reported in the journal Current Biology.
Cultural ripples
The research team, led by Ellen Garland from the University of Queensland, say the findings show the animals transmit such "cultural trends" over huge distances.

All it takes is a few roving males acting as cultural ambassadors to spread their songs
Peter Tyack
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
"Within a population, all males sing the same song," Ms Garland explained. "But that song is constantly changing. So we wanted to look at the dynamics of songs throughout an ocean basin."
To do this, she and her colleagues studied recordings of 775 humpback whale songs, taken by scientists from the South Pacific Whale Research Consortium.
"Lots of different sounds make up each song," Ms Garland explained.
"There are low frequency moans, groans and growls then higher cries and shrieks and all variations of ascents and descents.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/earth/hi/earth_news/newsid_9457000/9457855.stm

[amborin]

1. amazing; thanks for posting

[gateley]

2. Yep, amazing. Thank you. nt