Foundation for Marine Ecology and Telemetry Research

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Foundation for Marine Ecology and Telemetry Research

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Advancing marine species conservation through research, technology, and education

11/01/2026

While at the 26th Biennial Conference on the Biology of Marine Mammals in Puerto Rico, we came together to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the goose-beaked whale project at Isla Guadalupe. Congratulations!

10/28/2026

Exciting news from MarEcoTel!

We’re pleased to announce that MarEcoTel has been selected for a Navy SBIR Phase II award under topic N242-097: Unmanned Aerial System for Tag Deployment in Marine Mammal Monitoring. This project is being conducted in collaboration with Drone Amplified and Wildlife Computers.

Our team recently returned from the 26th Biennial Conference on the Biology of Marine Mammals in San Juan, Puerto Rico, where we had productive discussions with partners and members of the science community. Topics included advances in marine mammal research and the use of unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) for tag deployment.

We’re excited to build on these conversations and continue advancing innovative technologies to support marine mammal monitoring and research!

Follow the link in the comments to an article by Drone Amplified to learn more about this project!

09/11/2026

From compliance challenge to research advantage🐋

Marine researchers are leveraging D.A. Flight to improve the speed, consistency, and accuracy of drone-based photogrammetry while meeting NDAA compliance requirements. The technology is helping teams collect valuable marine mammal data more efficiently in demanding offshore environments.

Click on the link in the comments below to discover how drone innovation is advancing marine science!

07/03/2026

By now, we're sure you've all heard the incredibly sad news about the passing of our friend and colleague Stephanie Watwood.

As many of you may remember, we sold shirts with this design several years ago as a fundraiser for our friends and colleagues who were fighting cancer. The design was inspired by a conversation with Stephanie, where she told us that with her diagnosis, the odds weren't good. We then reminded ourselves that the beaked whales we study consistently defy what we think is probable and expand what we know is possible. Our resident artist, Erin Keene, took this concept and created the design.

The first round of shirts were sold as a fundraiser for Dana Farber Cancer Institute. This one is simply done in memory of our friend and colleague, Steph, and anyone else who has dealt with cancer.

Shirts are just $19, and available here:
https://brembuilt.com/collections/marecotel

Shipping is available for both international and US orders. If you would prefer to pick up, we can bring your order to the Society for Marine Mammalogy conference in October if you'll be attending, or you can make other arrangements with MarEcoTel directly ([email protected]).

Regardless, if you're going to the SMM conference, bring your shirt and we'll arrange a group photo in memory of Steph!

Secondly, in coordination with Steph's family, Erin will be leading a in-memoriam article for Aquatic Mammals. If you have stories, photos, or other things you'd like to share, please use this link to submit your contributions.

https://forms.gle/JEDh2ED1pwfMtq5h7

Take care of yourselves.

05/22/2026

Big welcome to our newest team member! We are happy to have you on board at MarEcoTel!

Clara Bird is a behavioral ecologist using remote sensing to study marine mammals. She has a B.Sc. in Biology (concentration Ecology) and Environmental Science (Marine Science and Conservation) from Duke University and a Ph.D. in Wildlife Science from Oregon State University where she also worked as a postdoctoral scholar. She has experience studying both foraging and social behavior and is specifically interested in understanding the relationships between behavior, physiology, environment, and individual characteristics. Clara has been working with drones since 2017 and has been involved in developing methods for drone-based photogrammetry of cetaceans including several software packages. When she’s not in the field or at her desk, she enjoys baking, exploring the outdoors, and community theater.

04/27/2026

We are really, really excited to announce the latest publication on our behavioral response work with beaked whales off Southern California!

"Assessment of goose-beaked whale responses to mid-frequency active sonar using a Hierarchical hidden Markov model"

Just released in the journal Movement Ecology, this open-access work presents the analysis of data from thirteen SMRT tags deployed on goose-beaked whales (aka Cuvier’s beaked whales, or Ziphius cavirostris) at the Southern California Anti-submarine Warfare Range. These tags recorded the movements, diving behavior, vocalizations, and acoustic environment of tagged whales for days to weeks at a time, in a place where they are frequently exposed to the powerful military sonar systems used in naval training exercises.

This work required developing a model that can combine very large and complex datasets from multiple whales in a single framework, and use these data to describe whale behavior at both coarse-scale (like how often they dive and for how long) and fine-scale levels (like how they move their bodies over 5-min periods). The model can then be used to understand how behavior is likely to change with sonar level. The US Navy and National Marine Fisheries Service need data like this to better assess the impacts of permitted training activities on local populations.

We can’t understate what a challenge this work has been. If you read this paper, you will see that it focuses heavily on the method itself, which we hope will benefit not just our work with this species, but any projects seeking to characterize behavioral responses to human activities in any species with multi-scale behavioral data.

Link to paper in comments.

Address

2468 Camp McKenzie Trl NW
Seabeck, WA
98380

Telephone

(206) 550-9806

Website

http://www.marecotel.org/

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