Old whale sound recordings captured off Bermuda in 1949, Woods Hole says

PORTLAND, Maine — Researchers on Cape Cod, Massachusetts said they have discovered what they described as the oldest known recordings of whale sounds, including the song of a humpback whale captured in March 1949 off Bermuda.

Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution researchers in Falmouth, Massachusetts said the humpback whale recording was made during that March 1949 expedition, and that the find could help scientists understand how whales communicate.

The AP report said the recording is important because it documents whale song during a period when the ocean was quieter. Scientists said that context can help them better understand how new human-made sounds, such as shipping noise, may affect whale communication.

The AP said the recordings date to a time when Woods Hole researchers on a research vessel were testing sonar systems and running acoustic experiments alongside the U.S. Office of Naval Research. Researchers said the sounds were captured using crude audio equipment, but that the audio was preserved on a plastic disc rather than tape, allowing it to survive.

The AP report also said the new discovery predates later whale-song work by almost 20 years, and that it predates Roger Payne’s whale-song discovery by nearly 20 years. Payne is also connected in the report to the 1970 album “Songs of the Humpback Whale,” which the AP said sold more than 100,000 copies.

The AP framed whale sound as central to survival and social behavior. It said more than 90 species of whales, dolphins and porpoises make sounds, which it described as clicks, whistles and calls, and said scientists consider the signals useful for finding food, navigating, locating each other and understanding surroundings.

The report also discussed how ocean noise has changed. It said scientists estimate some parts of the ocean are 10 times louder than they were in the 1960s, and it cited research from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in the mid-2000s that found underwater ocean noise off southern California increased tenfold compared with the 1960s.

In describing humpback whales, the AP said the animals can weigh more than 55,000 pounds (24,947 kilograms), and it said humpback songs have been recorded for human listening over the years. It also said Payne produced “Songs of the Humpback Whale” in 1970 and connected the album to a global movement to end commercial whale hunting.