Acoustic issues in studies of behavioral response of humpback whales to seismic ramp-up and hard start

Two large behavioral response studies (BRS) have been conducted with humpback whales migrating along the east Australian coastline (in project BRAHSS: Behavioural Response of Australian Humpback Whales to Seismic Surveys). Whales were exposed to four stages of ramp-up with nominally 6 dB increase in level at each step, and a hard start nominally 12 dB above the first stage. Observations of behavior were made by theodolite teams ashore and small boats following specific whale groups, DTAGs, and binoculars from the source vessel. The sound field throughout the area was recorded using five buoys that radioed data back to the shore station, four autonomous receivers and two drifting systems with a vertical array of four hydrophones. Measurements show that the propagation loss at the site is variable and includes patches of anomalously high loss. This complicates estimation of the sound levels received by whales, but may not be unusual in near shore environments. This paper presents preliminary results of the ...