Methods are developed for estimating the size/density of cetacean populations using data from a set of fixed passive acoustic sensors. The methods convert the number of detected acoustic cues into animal density by accounting for (i) the probability of detecting cues, (ii) the rate at which animals produce cues, and (iii) the proportion of false positive detections. Additional information is often required for estimation of these quantities, for example, from an acoustic tag applied to a sample of animals. Methods are illustrated with a case study: estimation of Blainville’s beaked whale density over a period in spring 2005, using an 82 hydrophone wide-baseline array located in the Tongue of the Ocean, Bahamas. To estimate the required quantities, additional data are used from digital acoustic tags, attached to five whales over 21 deep dives, where cues recorded on some of the dives are associated with those received on the fixed hydrophones. Estimated density was 25.3 or 22.5 animals/, depending on assumptions about false positive detections, with 95% confidence intervals 17.3–36.9 and 15.4–32.9. These methods are potentially applicable to a wide variety of marine and terrestrial species that are hard to survey using conventional visual methods.
Skip Nav Destination
,
,
,
,
Article navigation
April 2009
April 01 2009
Estimating cetacean population density using fixed passive acoustic sensors: An example with Blainville’s beaked whales
Tiago A. Marques;
Tiago A. Marques
a)
Centre for Research into Ecological and Environmental Modelling, The Observatory,
University of St Andrews
, St Andrews KY16 9LZ, Scotland
Search for other works by this author on:
Len Thomas;
Len Thomas
Centre for Research into Ecological and Environmental Modelling, The Observatory,
University of St Andrews
, St Andrews KY16 9LZ, Scotland
Search for other works by this author on:
Jessica Ward;
Jessica Ward
Naval Undersea Warfare Center Division
, 1176 Howell Street, Newport, Rhode Island 02841
Search for other works by this author on:
Nancy DiMarzio;
Nancy DiMarzio
Naval Undersea Warfare Center Division
, 1176 Howell Street, Newport, Rhode Island 02841
Search for other works by this author on:
Peter L. Tyack
Peter L. Tyack
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
, Woods Hole, Massachusetts 02543
Search for other works by this author on:
Tiago A. Marques
a)
Len Thomas
Jessica Ward
Nancy DiMarzio
Peter L. Tyack
Centre for Research into Ecological and Environmental Modelling, The Observatory,
University of St Andrews
, St Andrews KY16 9LZ, Scotlanda)
Electronic mail: [email protected]; URL: http://www.creem.st-and.ac.uk/decaf/
J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 125, 1982–1994 (2009)
Article history
Received:
December 02 2008
Accepted:
February 05 2009
Citation
Tiago A. Marques, Len Thomas, Jessica Ward, Nancy DiMarzio, Peter L. Tyack; Estimating cetacean population density using fixed passive acoustic sensors: An example with Blainville’s beaked whales. J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 1 April 2009; 125 (4): 1982–1994. https://doi.org/10.1121/1.3089590
Download citation file:
Pay-Per-View Access
$40.00
Sign In
You could not be signed in. Please check your credentials and make sure you have an active account and try again.
Citing articles via
Focality of sound source placement by higher (ninth) order ambisonics and perceptual effects of spectral reproduction errors
Nima Zargarnezhad, Bruno Mesquita, et al.
Related Content
Effective beam pattern of the Blainville's beaked whale (Mesoplodon densirostris) and implications for passive acoustic monitoring
J. Acoust. Soc. Am. (March 2013)
Trackline and point detection probabilities for acoustic surveys of Cuvier's and Blainville's beaked whales
J. Acoust. Soc. Am. (September 2013)
Spatio-temporal variation in click production rates of beaked whales: Implications for passive acoustic density estimation
J. Acoust. Soc. Am. (March 2017)
Sounds recorded in the presence of Blainville’s beaked whales, Mesoplodon densirostris, near Hawai’i
J. Acoust. Soc. Am. (July 2007)
Shifts in frequency-modulated pulses recorded during an encounter with Blainville's beaked whales (Mesoplodon densirostris)
J. Acoust. Soc. Am. (August 2016)