Research on whale eyesight may help reduce entanglements in fishing gear

WHO: New England Aquarium Vice President of Research Scott D Kraus, PhD will dive deep into the topic of whale eyesight and his work to develop alternative entanglement risk-assessment models for ropes and fishing gear to decrease the number of whale deaths right here in New England.

WHAT: Both North Atlantic right whales and humpback whales get entangled in fishing gear along the East Coast of the U.S. at rates that are unsustainable for these endangered species. Failure to solve this problem may jeopardize the viability of several fisheries.

Dr. Kraus and his team set out to study why whales don’t see ropes and avoid them. They wondered if ropes can be developed that provide whales a visual deterrent that helps avert entanglements. They questioned: Do those changes put whales at risk of encounters with fishing gear? Do they see color? Can they see at night or in the darkest depths of the ocean? How small an object can they see?

Whales live in a world where visibility is rarely more than 40 feet, and most whale researchers believe they find their way around by sound. In fact, their use of sound is critical, but for close-up interactions with neighbors, feeding, and collision avoidance, vision may be even more important. Over the last five years, the Aquarium has done field and laboratory experiments to develop an understanding of what whales see. Dr. Kraus’s nighttime whale work was recently featured in Scientific American. Join him to find out how his team’s findings may help reduce fatal entanglements by large whales in fishing gear.

WHEN: The free lecture takes place Tuesday, May 10 at 7 p.m.

WHERE: New England Aquarium’s Simons IMAX Theatre, Central Wharf, Boston, Mass.

REGISTRATION: Register online: http://support.neaq.org/site/Calendar?id=106525&view=Detail

THANKS: The Aquarium’s series of free lectures, films and discussions is made possible by the generous support of the Lowell Institute.