Curious Narwhals Turn Surveillance Tools Into Targets Beneath the Ice
Narwhals keep ramming into underwater listening devices in a remote Greenland fjord, and scientists are trying to understand why. What seemed like silent, low-impact research tools have become magnets for some of the Arctic’s most elusive whales, according to Discover Wildlife.
These collisions happened hundreds of times. Probably more. And they weren’t random bumps in the dark.
The animals kept coming back.
Narwhals repeatedly collide with deep-sea hydrophones.
A Curious Attraction
The three hydrophones sat between 190 and 400 meters deep in the Inglefield Bredning Fjord. During more than 4,000 hours of recordings, researchers captured the sound of narwhals rubbing, knocking, and buzzing near the moorings—sometimes over ten times in a single day, Discover Magazine reports.
Indigenous Inughuit hunters who helped deploy the devices recognized this behavior immediately. They see narwhals entangle themselves in unattended gear, and some believe the whales enjoy playing with objects in their environment.
The impacts occurred hundreds of times during the study period.
Mistaken for a Meal?
Stomach content analysis from 16 harvested narwhals showed diets dominated by cod, with shrimp and squid mixed in. Researchers suspect the whales may have mistaken the smooth, anchored recorders for prey resting on the seafloor, Phys.org reports.
The foraging buzz recorded just before contact reinforces that possibility. But the behavior didn’t stop with hunting sounds. Long “rubbing” noises often followed, hinting at skin sliding across the device. Some Arctic whales rub on rocks when molting, though narwhal molting remains poorly understood.
Still, these moorings were deep. Seeking them out required energy. Something was drawing the whales in.
Implications for Arctic Research
Hydrophones are supposed to sit quietly and observe. But if narwhals are investigating them this often, the tools may be altering behavior instead of simply recording it. Nautilus notes that the presence of foreign objects might influence the very animals researchers hope to study unobtrusively.
The team now believes shorter mooring lines or redesigned equipment might reduce unintended interactions. Understanding how wildlife reacts to scientific infrastructure is becoming part of the work itself.
For now, the narwhals keep coming. Whether they think the devices are food, toys, or something in between, their behavior makes one thing clear: even in the quietest corners of the Arctic, they notice when something new arrives.
