Saturday, May 30, 2009

They heard blue whale sing

While the ocean world has been quiet, no freaque waves being reported anywhere for a few days, I find the following ScienceDaily news today about singing blue whale interesting:
ScienceDaily (May 30, 2009) — For the very first time in New York coastal waters, the voices of singing blue whales have been positively identified. Acoustic experts at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s Bioacoustics Research Program (BRP) and the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) confirmed that the voice of a singing blue whale was tracked about 70 miles off of Long Island and New York City on Jan. 10-11, 2009, as the whale swam slowly from east to west. At the same time, a second blue whale was heard singing offshore in the far distance.

“These endangered blue whales are the largest animals ever to have lived on this planet, and their voices can travel across an ocean. It’s just amazing to hear one singing out there on New York’s ocean stage only tens of miles from Carnegie Hall and Broadway!” said Christopher Clark, director of Cornell’s BRP. “This opens a whole new universe of opportunities for all of us to learn more about and appreciate these species and the vitality of New York’s marine environment.”

New York State’s DEC Commissioner Pete Grannis added, “This is a very important moment in the environmental history of New York State. Blue whales were almost hunted to extinction by the middle of the 20th Century, and the fact that now we're finding them migrating not far off our shores is truly remarkable. Although whaling no longer occurs in U.S. waters, whales still face numerous threats including vessel strikes and marine debris, and this latest finding will enable DEC and its partners to develop science-based management plans to protect these magnificent creatures.”

During 2008-2009, ten of Cornell’s acoustic recorders were deployed about 13 miles from the New York Harbor entrance and off the shores of Fire Island to study the acoustic environment of New York waters and examine whether noises, including shipping traffic, are affecting the whales. By knowing the whales’ seasonal presence, New York state policymakers can make critical conservation decisions to help protect blue whales by developing management plans to avoid ship collisions with whales and reduce noises that interfere with their communications.

The acoustic monitoring was initiated from March through mid-May of 2008 to record the northward migration of right whales from their calving grounds off the Florida eastern coast to their feeding grounds off Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts. Cornell scientists and DEC are able to monitor and provide specific data on the species that are detected, including when and where they occur in New York waters throughout the year.

Here's a NOAA picture of whales:

What comes to my mind immediately is that there are good efforts on making acoustic recordings to study the environment for whale protection, but no one seems to care the least about recording and studying freaque waves in the ocean environment to protect human!

In Genesis 1:26, God said

"Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. Let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, and the cattle, and over all the wild animals and all the creatures that crawl on the ground."

I believe in God!

Somehow nowadays, the "man" God made seems to have evolved into a politically incorrect thing. Every bad things in the world must be blamed on the guilt of "man". Blue whale is most certainly much much more important than "man". But wait, can't be all "man", because there must be some "man" who are making the rules to blame "man" have to be above "man". Who are they? Some "man" will never be get blamed no matter what they do. Why? Yes, indeed, no one dispute yet that "All men are created equal!" Really? But some "man" must be more equal than other "man". Some one may even been "lord high" because some one even been declared messiah. Who do they think they are? What in the world is going on?

Dear Lord, please help us ordinary insignificant "man"! We don't know what kind of world we are living in any more!

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