Preparations...

IWDG secured another grant from Island Foundation to fund the 4th humpback whale research expedition to Cape Verde. Our approach this year is similar to last years - 6 weeks of daily or twice daily surveys from a shore-based research station in Sal Rei, Boa Vista. Pedro Lopez Suarez has already been sending on photo ID images since he started fieldwork on board local whale-watching boats on 1 March. Since then, he has collected 14 fluke IDs and has observed several mother-calf pairs, breaching and competitive groups... so it is shaping up to be a good year for whales already.

This year's team will comprise myself, Simon Berrow, Pedro Lopez Suarez, Darren Craig among others. Our primary aim is to collect biopsy samples, photo ID images and acoustic recordings. These data will help us to  piece together the jig-saw puzzle in collaboration with international researchers in the US, Switzerland and Netherlands. Our knowledge of these whales is increasing steadily each year. We need to increase our genetic sample size in order to get a clearer picture of how genetically isolated or otherwise this population is. We had some nice photo ID matches between Cape Verde and Norway last year.... we have yet to obtain a match between CV and North America, so it appears (for the time being!) as though the range for these whales is exclusively in the eastern North Atlantic. 

There were several whales returning to Cape Verde last year that have been recorded since the 1990s, and in the past week, some of our favourite aerobats including "Cassnova" and "Notch" have been spotted. A comparison of genotypes using 20 'microsatellite' markers (comprising a genetic barcode, unique to individuals as used in forensics) has yet to be undertaken but promises to be very interesting as our colleagues Per and Martine have thousands of samples from all over the Atlantic to compare to these Cape Verdean whales. 

I will only be in the field for 2 weeks (12 - 26 April) as I have to submit my PhD thesis this summer so I had better knuckle down before I run out of time/funding/sanity! Darren has plenty of experience with humpback whale research from his time in Australia working with the HARC project among others. Darren will spend a full six weeks on Boa Vista, while Simon will join him for the final two weeks in mid May. 

Plans are afoot to establish a dedicated cetacean research station on an uninhabited island off the coast of Boa Vista and funding is currently being sought to make this a reality. Any information about funding avenues that have slipped under our radars for this would be gratefully appreciated. This is the brainchild of Pedro and if successful would allow us to continue long-overdue research on these whales in what is the single most important bay in the Atlantic for this population, as far as we know.

This blog will be quiet for a bit while we get ourselves and our equipment out to Cape Verde. I look forward to keeping you updated!

Conor Ryan