Sperm whale codas

Abstract

Short series of 3 to 40 or more clicks are produced by sperm whales, Physeter catodon, in stereotyped repetitive sequences or codas. The temporal click patterns in codas appear to be unique to individual whales over at least a few hours. It is suggested that sperm whale codas serve as a means of individual acoustic identification. An apparent exchange of codas between two animals was analyzed and acoustical locations calculated for the four-hydrophone array data that changes in underwater meovement coincided with changes in the coda sequences.