The Bahamas Beaked Whale Ecology Study is focused in the Northern Bahamas. This map shows our study area split into 4 transect grids: Northwest Providence Channel, Northeast Providence Channel, Tongue of the Ocean (aka TOTO) and Cul-de-Sac (the end of TOTO). These transect grids all fall within The Great Bahama Canyon - the largest underwater canyon in the world.
To make sure that our survey effort is evenly distributed throughout each transect grid we have created a series of randomly generated transect lines (or legs) within each grid. The ship follows the transect lines until we have a sighting, then we leave the line (if need be) to complete the encounter. At the end of the encounter we resume transit along the transect line until we have another sighting. The chart below shows our progress thus far. Each yellow line is a transect leg that we have run since we started on May 15th. We still have a few legs left to go (those in black off Grand Bahama)! Wish us luck!
0 comments:
Post a Comment