Source levels and call parameters of harbor seal breeding vocalizations near a terrestrial haulout site in Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve

Leanna P Matthews; Susan E Parks; Michelle E H Fournet; Christine M Gabriele; Jamie N Womble; Holger Klinck

doi:10.1121/1.4978299

Source levels and call parameters of harbor seal breeding vocalizations near a terrestrial haulout site in Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve

J Acoust Soc Am. 2017 Mar;141(3):EL274. doi: 10.1121/1.4978299.

Authors

Leanna P Matthews¹, Susan E Parks¹, Michelle E H Fournet², Christine M Gabriele³, Jamie N Womble⁴, Holger Klinck⁵

Affiliations

¹ Biology Department, Syracuse University, Syracuse, New York 13244, USA lematthe@syr.edu, sparks@syr.edu.
² Department of Fisheries and Wildlife, Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon 97331, USA michelle.fournet@gmail.com.
³ Humpback Whale Monitoring Program, Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve, Gustavus, Alaska 99826, USA chris_gabriele@nps.gov.
⁴ Glacier Bay Field Station, National Park Service, Juneau, Alaska 99801, USA jamie_womble@nps.gov.
⁵ Bioacoustics Research Program, Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York 14850, USA Holger.Klinck@cornell.edu.

PMID: 28372144
DOI: 10.1121/1.4978299

Abstract

Source levels of harbor seal breeding vocalizations were estimated using a three-element planar hydrophone array near the Beardslee Islands in Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve, Alaska. The average source level for these calls was 144 dB_RMS re 1 μPa at 1 m in the 40-500 Hz frequency band. Source level estimates ranged from 129 to 149 dB_RMS re 1 μPa. Four call parameters, including minimum frequency, peak frequency, total duration, and pulse duration, were also measured. These measurements indicated that breeding vocalizations of harbor seals near the Beardslee Islands of Glacier Bay National Park are similar in duration (average total duration: 4.8 s, average pulse duration: 3.0 s) to previously reported values from other populations, but are 170-220 Hz lower in average minimum frequency (78 Hz).

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Acoustics / instrumentation
Alaska
Animals
Breeding*
Equipment Design
Ice Cover
Motion
Parks, Recreational
Pattern Recognition, Automated
Phoca / classification
Phoca / physiology*
Phoca / psychology
Seasons
Sexual Behavior, Animal*
Signal Processing, Computer-Assisted
Signal-To-Noise Ratio
Sound
Sound Spectrography
Species Specificity
Time Factors
Transducers, Pressure
Vocalization, Animal*
Water

Substances

Water