Whale language is richer than we thought

Humpback whales use up to 35 sounds during communication activities. They also have " shifts " for finding partners, a study conducted in Australia showed.

Previously, scientists thought humpback whales communicated with a few sounds, including simple calls signaling fish and some rather complex " songs " from males when Find and conquer your partner.

A humpback whale (Photo: LiveScience)

For further research, scientists at the University of Queensland (Australia) tracked the sounds and activities of humpback whales as they moved from Antarctica - whale spawning sites - to Australia along the east coast of this country.

"The most surprising thing is that they communicate with each other in 35 different types of sounds, while we think that number is 10 at most," said Rebecca Dunlop, the lead researcher.

When deep in the water, humpback whales produce sounds by mouth. When they are on the water, they make sounds by beating their tails or getting into the water.

Scientists found that these sounds seem to be very important to whales in their daily lives, such as helping whales to keep in touch with each other. Males and females seem to have specific sounds.

Male whales use complex sounds to seduce females. This shows that sound is the basic sexual signal in the " love songs " of whales. In terms of confession, humpback whales have a method similar to some birds. Only the thing, the bird, the length of the " song " or the size of the sound is the sexual signal.

A study published earlier this year confirms that whales' favorite songs have a clear grammatical rule.

Interestingly, Dunlop's team found that some sounds only appear in single individuals. This shows that they are not only used in communication activities.

Research can help scientists understand how noises from ships and other man-made noises affect whale life.

"Human-induced sounds appear more and more in the oceans. It's hard to know how they affect whales if they don't know how they communicate with each other in an environment that doesn't exist. noise ", Dunlop said.

Viet Linh