Kauai Whale Watching Tours
MEDIA RELEASE (Hawaii 24/7, 20 Jan. 2012)
The non-profit Hawai’i Marine Mammal Consortium (HMMC) is pleased to announce the release of a glossy, full-color art poster of humpback whale tail fluke photographs. The poster illustrates the beauty of humpback whale flukes and how scientists use them to study whales. Like human fingerprints, the shape, color, and markings on the tail flukes of humpback whales are unique to each whale. The poster shows 56 photographs of 53 different whales with a built-in “fluke matching” quiz to identify three whales that appear twice in the photos. The answers can be found at the HMMC website: www.hmmc.org
Sightings of individually identified whales over the years help scientists to describe their social behavior, migrations, and life histories. The website shows information about the sighting history of each whale and links to pages about whale biology and behavior. All photographs were taken under a NOAA Fisheries Scientific Research Permit.
Copies of the poster are available at select locations on Hawai’i Island, including Hawai’i Ocean Sports and The Gallery at Bamboo Restaurant in Hawi. It is also available by mail through the HMMC website. The purchase of the poster is tax deductible, and proceeds will directly support HMMC’s whale and dolphin research in Hawai’i.
The HMMC is a Waimea-based 501(c)(3) non-profit organization founded in 2003 by four biologists who first met while conducting whale research for the University of Hawai’i on the Big Island in the early 1990′s. Local residents may have noticed this group at their hillside whale observation site off Akoni Pule Highway just north of Kawaihae and from their vessel-based work each winter out of Kawaihae Harbor. The HMMC also assists with whale disentanglement efforts led by the Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary. The group focuses on marine mammal conservation, research and education and has a science advisory group from top universities around the U.S. and abroad. The HMMC hosts education programs for classes of high school and college students from Hawai’i and the mainland, including an annual week-long class on whale bioacoustics for Cornell University students and a collaboration with faculty at the University of Alaska Southeast in Sitka and the University of Hawai’i Hilo to connect students from Hawai’i and Alaska. For more information about HMMC scientists, research, education programs and scientific papers, visit www.hmmc.org or email info@hmmc.org
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