QENTOL, YEN Marine Guardians & SFU partner to capture endangered whale data

A new partnership between the QENTOL, YEN Marine Guardians, and Simon Fraser University will capture critical data on endangered South Island Resident Killer Whales (SRKW).

The installation of hydrophones, underwater devices that detect and capture sound undetectable to the human ear, will be placed in strategic locations around the Salish Sea.

Once the hydrophones are installed QENTOL, YEN and SFU will be able to share the sounds of whale calls and clicks, along with the sounds of marine traffic with the public to raise awareness of the importance of protecting the whales. The partnership aims to promote boating at a safe distance, as well as advocating for the enforcement of protected zones where SRKW’s can hunt undisturbed.

Transcript of Interview

Interviewer: Can you introduce yourself?

Ruth:

Okay, I am working here at Simon Fraser University in the School of Environmental Science. I have been here for about five years. And prior to that, I worked in marine mammal science.

David:

Well, my name is David Dick, also known as Southern Resident Killer Whale Senior Manager here at the W̱SÁNEĆ Leadership Council building the team, there are a total of seven staff. I have three guardians, a data analysis person, a biologist, and a marine clerk. I'm really excited to work with Ruth and SFU.

Interviewer: What’s the name of this program?

Ruth:

We're called humans and algorithms listening and looking for orcas just h a l l o

David:

For us, it's about the protection of the KELŁOLEMEĆEN, the relatives of the deep. And so having this additional tool for our QENTOL, YEN program is just another added advantage for us to take steps in protecting our relatives of the deep. Being able to collaborate with like-minded allies like Ruth - that's in our vision. It just builds more excitement for our program, to elevate the work that we're doing that taking that next step in the work we're doing for the protection of not only just for the southern resident killer whales but for the bigs and the other whales that transit through the area; because they don't know about these big ships that are coming through here. And the ships are just getting bigger and faster. And so being able to work with Ruth and others who are interested in protecting our relatives of the deepest is impeccable.

Interviewer: Why is it so important to protect the SRKW’s?

Ruth:

Speaking to the urgency, they don't count them (the whales) until they're a year old. So my number of 73 is still valid within the J clan, which includes the pods of J K. and L. Last year, there hadn't been a new K pod member born for 11 years. So really the reproductive rates are very, very low. Survival also has not been comparable to the northern residents which also each and examine and kind of as a population against which, with Chinook Salmon, we often compare the Southern Resident Killer Whales. There are also a lot of pollutants and toxins that seem to be by accumulating as killer whales are at the top of the food chain. So all those toxins that they pick up in their food accumulate in their blubber, and then because they're under food and stress, the blubber itself gets metabolized, and that makes the toxins mobile within their body. So there's a number of reasons why we're very concerned about the Southern Resident killer whales beyond noise, but noise from commercial shipping makes everything more difficult. They can't find the food and the food is in places where that overlaps with the shipping lanes.

David:

For us here at the QENTOL, YEN program, I'm always looking for that next step in the work that we're doing, not only for our guardians' program, but for the leadership council when it comes to protection of the relatives of the deeo. And so I'm looking for that competitive advantage in a sense, is there one technology that can be used, not only for protection, but actually collecting real-time data, and having this opportunity to have to hydrophones in our traditional territory in the southern Gulf Islands area is incredible to give you an opportunity to hear the sounds not only from the orcas in the whales, but also from the ships that pass and being able to put this on our website so people can understand the urgency and the work that we're doing. Being able to have a partnership with SFU and Ruth and her team is it's really exciting.

Interviewer: What’s next for the program?

David:

Right now we’re going to do site visits. Looking at the best locations for the two hydrophones, so there'll be one set up on the eastern side of the Gulf Islands within Gulf Islands National Park Reserve Area and other one we're looking to inactive past summer. We're just in talks with the people who are going to be installing the hydrophones and despite where's the best location for the work that we're going to be doing.

Interviewer: Can you explain how hydrophones work?

Ruth:

Well, there are various different types, but the kind that we're interested in is basically a listening device that's placed underwater, and it picks up across a broad frequency range. The sounds are translations of different pressure waves at different frequencies. So if you make a very high pitch sound, you have a very fast, high-pitch frequency and very low-pitch sounds like those of commercial vessels have longer sound waves. And so those are registered by an underwater microphone as different frequencies from the sound generation, and that's kind of how our eardrum works and it picks up the differences in pressure waves and translates them into sound. So it's the same principle, there's a membrane on the inside of the microphone that translates the pressure waves into a sound. And so if you think of a Southern Resident Killer Whale, for example, they have a large melon on the front which helps to focus the sound that comes out of a set of phonic lips in their head. And that creates, for example, I'm talking about very high-frequency echolocation clicks, which is how they find their food. And so they have various ways to either make their echolocation broad focus like this then as you find a fish say you can change that and focus the echolocation clicks onto the target organism that you're chasing. And so that's the idea and the way that they receive the sound is through their Jawbone so they have a very adapted head for processing the sound that comes through the jaw and into the eardrum, in more or less the same way as we process sound, but they can hear sound at much higher frequencies than we can. So all of that echolocation sound happens at frequencies that we can't hear. So we need special instruments to even be able to hear the echolocation sounds so it's very complex, but also they have enormous brains and they just know how to do amazing things. That we as humans can't really even imagine.

Interviewer: Is there anything else you want to share with viewers?

David:

Yeah, I just want to thank Ruth, you know, it's been a long process over the last year and a bit and, you know, being able to connect with someone who has the background and the willingness to open up and reach out to myself as a person who's just developing a program from scratch. I remember when she contacted me and I was like, “Well, I'm just I'm building my program right now. So I'm not ready for you, but I want to work with you.” So I am thanking her for her patience with me because it's going to be a learning process for me because this isn't my background. But at the same time, you know, being able to share this with our youth and other First Nations group and say “ You know what, there are people out there, groups who want to work with us, with us First Nations who have the same interest in protecting our KELŁOLEMEĆEN, the relatives of the deep, you know, I say ÍY SȻACEL SIAM / thank you very much.

Ruth:

Thank you, David, very much appreciate this partnership. And as you know, we've been working at this for a long time and we had a real breakthrough. Last week with the signing of the WLC data contribution. I'm not sure what it's called, but the agreement that allows us to formally work together although we've been working together for many, many months if not, I think we're over a year and some now trying to get this thing off the ground. So it really feels good from my perspective where I'm sitting to be even be honored with this interview. So thank you