2UE whale

(Mike Williams, 2UE)
Yes, who would have thought humpback whales have so much in common with the likes of the Rolling Stones or Coldplay!
A Macquarie University academic has found humpback whales behave a lot like musicians. They like to get together to have a jam and swap a few songs. In humpback terms that means learning to sing each others' whale songs.
Libby Eyre from Macquarie's Biological Sciences Museum studied two groups of whales that migrate from Antarctica to warm tropical waters in the Pacific each year.
The first group is one most people in Sydney will be familiar. These are humpbacks that travel up the NSW coast every June and July to mate and breed in Queensland.
The second group do much the same thing, but travel up via New Zealand to the warm waters around Tonga.
It's long been thought that these whale groups don't have too much to do with each other once they get to their breeding grounds, which are about two or three thousand kilometres apart.
The male whales sing songs which can travel hundreds of kilometres through the ocean.
Libby studied the songs of both groups of whales and found as they make their ways North they each have a distinct and unique whale song. It can last for up to 30 minutes and cover eight octaves.
But by the time they come down the coast something unexpected happens.
In certain years NSW whales come down the coast singing snatches of the Tongan whale song. And presumably the Tongan whales make their way south.
There's a bit of a mystery how they learn the tunes.
It seems somehow these groups are coming into contact with each other, listening to each others' tunes and swapping them.
Whale song is beautiful but it remains mysterious. We're unsure exactly how the sound is generated, but presumably it's done using the larynx, the end of the windpipe.
Libby says there are four theories on why male whales sing.
One is they're saying I'm a big, strong male whale so all you other males better stay away.
Another is that they're singing to females saying I'm a big, strong males whale and gee I'd make a great dad for your calves.
The third is they're saying everybody, this is the way to go, let's stick together.
The final theory is that it's a combination of all of those.
The findings just add to our understanding of how intelligent whales are. It's a timely reminder at a time when Japan has again been pushing for the return of commercial whaling at the International Whaling Commission in the Carribbean. That move was defeated by Japan still harvests whales for supposedly scientific purposes.Despite killing the whales in the name of science, nuch of their meat apparently ends up on Japanese tables.