Before telling you a bit more about my project and this summer field season, I would like to introduce the beautiful place where I will be spending the next 3 years. New Caledonia is an archipelago located in the southwest Pacific Ocean, east of Australia. This special overseas French collectivity includes a main island (Grande Terre) and several other islands such as the Loyalty Islands. New Caledonia\u2019s lagoon is the largest in the world and was added to the list of the UNESCO world heritage sites in 2008, because of its exceptional biodiversity including many emblematic species such as humpback whales, dugongs, marine turtles, manta rays\u2026and many others.<\/p>\n
). \n Map of the New Caledonian Archipelago (map: http:\/\/<\/em>crosbiew.wordpress.com<\/em><\/a>).<\/em><\/p>\n Moreover, the \u2018Natural Park of the Coral Sea\u2019 <\/strong>was established very recently by the New Caledonian to protect this biodiversity hotspot. This monumental marine park spans 1.3 million square kilometres and is, to date, the largest protected area on the planet. As the detailed management plan for this park will be progressively established in the coming years, there is a local need for more information about marine mega-fauna space use in order to define key areas for wildlife conservation. Thus, the description of the humpback whales ecological niche in New Caledonian waters is the next logical step to initiate conservation planning. The effect of human activities needs to be investigated as the New Caledonian humpback whales population forms an isolated breeding sub-stock and is exposed to mining industry intensification, shipping, harbour construction and boat recreation associated to tourism development.<\/p>\n The general aim of my project is to investigate how humpback whales are using their habitat within and between reproductive areas of Oceania in order to facilitate their conservation at the scale of giant marine reserves (new generation of marine protected areas over vast surfaces exceeding hundreds of thousands of square kilometres). I will therefore focus on the spatial ecology of humpback whales in the New Caledonian Exclusive Economic Zone, with several specific aims:<\/p>\n 1\/ to quantify the spatio-temporal patterns and dynamics of humpback whale distribution in New Caledonian waters in order to identify key areas for the species and determine if these areas change over time or depending on social context.<\/p>\n 2\/ to assess the connectivity and movement patterns between areas of interest at individual scale.<\/p>\n 3\/ to document humpback whale use of habitat in relation to environmental factors and include these results in the broader-context of the South Pacific Ocean breeding areas.<\/p>\n 4\/ to provide a spatial and temporal assessment of the anthropogenic activities risks to humpback whales in New Caledonia.<\/p>\n I will rely on a large amount of data collected between 1991 and present, and provided by Op\u00e9ration C\u00e9tac\u00e9s<\/strong> (an NGO involved in scientific research on humpback whales and other marine mammals in Oceania since 1996), including boat-based, land-based and aerial observations, satellite tracking and individual-based information (via Photo-Identification and genotyping).<\/p>\n This year, I am taking part in the summer field mission undergone by Op\u00e9ration C\u00e9tac\u00e9s in the South Lagoon. I am currently living in Prony<\/strong>, a little village located along the southern coast of Grande Terre. No electricity, no internet, whale watching from 7am to 4pm on a daily basis: the real life!<\/p>\n In my next post I will tell you a bit more about this field trip with Op\u00e9ration C\u00e9tac\u00e9s but for now, I will let you enjoy these few pictures!<\/p>\n \n Prony Bay <\/em>(\u00a9 S. Derville)<\/em><\/p>\n R\u00e9mi, Claire and Daisy standing next to the \u201cCap N\u2019Dua\u201d lighthouse from which land observations are made. Whales can be spotted up to 20 nautical miles offshore<\/em> (\u00a9 S. Derville)\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n \n \n View to the East of Cap N\u2019Dua (\u00a9 S. Derville)<\/em><\/p>\n \n \n \n Inverted peduncle slap (the whale is lying upside down in the water and energetically slapping the surface with its fluke) (\u00a9 S. Derville).<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" **GUEST POST**\u00a0written by\u00a0Sol\u00e8ne Derville\u00a0from the\u00a0Institute of Research for Development, Noum\u00e9a, New Caledonia. Entropie Lab Last term I posted about the analysis of Maui dolphin habitat selection I have undergone under Dr Leigh Torres\u2019 supervision at OSU. The results of this work are now compiled in a manuscript which I hope to submit for publication very … Continue reading From Oregon to New Caledonia: Crossing latitudes<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5886,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[2674,712774,96374,215877,712780,712783],"class_list":["post-340","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-connectivity","tag-distribution","tag-habitat","tag-humpback-whales","tag-new-caledonia","tag-south-pacific-ocean"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/340","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5886"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=340"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/340\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":359,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/340\/revisions\/359"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=340"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=340"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=340"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"new+caledonia+map\"](\"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/gemmlab\/files\/2015\/09\/new-caledonia-map.gif\")
<\/a>New Caledonia location in South Pacific Ocean (map:\u00a0<\/em>http:\/\/springtimeofnations.blogspot.jp<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>
\n<\/a>Breach observed a few days ago in the South Lagoon (\u00a9 C. Garrigue)<\/em><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n