Wednesday, January 23, 2013

Alone on a wide wide sea



I recently came across this whale (pictured above), who has lived her entire life without a friend, a community, a lover.
She's all alone because she sounds different from all the other whales. While they call at between 12 and 25 hz, she sings at 52 hz, which is really low, just above the lowestr note on a tuba.
Theories about why she calls like that include the hypothesis that she is a hybrid between 2 species of whale, or that she is malformed, or even deaf.
But the fact remains that she keeps swimming in the wide wide sea, singing a song no one can hear, understand, or answer.

The original article is here: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/21/science/21whal.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1358917521-5JYhPL6urkLp/5M5TysO8A

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