Cetacean sighting records during a seismic survey in the New Caledonia Basin, Tasman Sea, 2015-6

The distribution of marine mammal species in many areas remains poorly understood, especially as observations for some taxa are rare and large-scale surveys are time consuming and extremely costly. Here, we present 36 records of 7 cetacean species (Balaenoptera brydei, B. musculus subspp., Delphinus delphis, Globicephala sp., Grampus griseus, Physeter macrocephalus, Pseudorca crassidens) in the New Caledonia Basin, Tasman Sea. Data were derived from a platform of opportunity during a seismic survey that ran between December 2015 and March 2016, inclusively. The two most frequently encountered species were sperm whales (Physeter macrocephalus, 13 sightings, 5 acoustic detections) and blue whales (Balaenoptera musculus subspp., 8 visual detections). All encountered species are known to occur in New Zealand waters at least occasionally, based on historical sightings and stranding records. However, data presented here are the first cetacean records for this specific area and demonstrate that seismic vessels can act as a platform of opportunity for studying cetacean distribution in poorly accessible areas. Such data will aid future research efforts including species distribution models on cetaceans in the South Pacific.

Citation: Peters K J, Stockin K A (2024). Cetacean sighting records during a seismic survey in the New Caledonia Basin, Tasman Sea, 2015-6. Version 1.0. Southwestern Pacific Ocean Biogeographic Information System (OBIS) Node. Samplingevent dataset. https://nzobisipt.niwa.co.nz/resource?r=cetaceans_newcaledoniabasin_2015&v=1.0

Published: April 09, 2024 at 06:07

License: This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY 4.0) License

URL: https://nzobisipt.niwa.co.nz/resource?r=cetaceans_newcaledoniabasin_2015