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Emily T Griffiths

@emilytgriffiths.com

67 followers 58 following 37 posts

🇺🇸➡️🇩🇰 Marine Acoustic Biologist. Special Consultant at @marinemammalsau.bsky.social. Room temperature takes all my own.

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Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · Mar 20

Look at all our smiling faces. Thrilled to be part of this stellar team!

Marine Mammal Research at Aarhus University, Ecoscience @marinemammalsau.bsky.social · Mar 20

Welcome to the Marine Mammal Section at Aarhus University! 🐋 (@au.dk) Here, we will share weekly updates on our research, discoveries and fieldwork, along with insights from our team of wildlife researchers🐬🐻‍❄️🦭. If you are interested in what we do, stay tuned. We have a lot to share.. ✨

Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · Aug 7

'Reducing our dependence on whales as an energy source will send us sliding down the slippery, spermaceti-lubricated slope to socialism.'

McSweeney's @mcsweeneys.net · Aug 7

"Reducing our dependence on whales as an energy source will send us sliding down the slippery, spermaceti-lubricated slope to socialism. If we give up whaling, what will those lackwits come for next? Will I have to surrender my peg leg for a titanium prosthetic?"

I’m Captain Ahab and I Say We Must Never Transition Away from a Whale-Based Energy Industry

When I heard that the globalist oligarchs and fat cats in the Washington marshland were conspiring to invest in alternative, non-whale-based energy...

buff.ly

Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · Aug 6

This results in three sperm whales forming a defensive position against the harassing orcas. This audio, detailed in our paper, has also been made publicly available for potential use in other studies.

This work was spearheaded by Mel Cosentino.

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Skittish Males in High Latitudes: Complex Social and Acoustic Response of Adult Male Sperm Whales When Harassed by Orcas

Click on the article title to read more.

onlinelibrary.wiley.com

Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · Aug 6

New paper! Here we report four opportunistic observations of orcas harassing adult male sperm whales near Andenes, Norway. In one instance of recorded audio one sperm whale, using a series of clangs and codas, appears to call to other sperm whales nearby when approached by a group of orcas. See 🖼️⤵️.

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Reposted by Emily T Griffiths

David Ho @davidho.bsky.social · Jul 30

Motherfucking wind farms…

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Reposted by Emily T Griffiths

Marine Mammal Research at Aarhus University, Ecoscience @marinemammalsau.bsky.social · Jul 6

PhD student Emilie Stepien uses satellite tags, CATS Cams and drones to observe seal reactions to shipping in the Wadden sea 🇩🇰
Watch a pregnant seal reacting to a sea eagle caught on drone video 🦅🦭

@emstepien.bsky.social 🧪🌐

#Wildlife #WaddenSea #HarbourSeal #AnimalBehaviour #MarineEcology

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Reposted by Emily T Griffiths

Marine Mammal Research at Aarhus University, Ecoscience @marinemammalsau.bsky.social · Jun 30

Our Senior Researcher Fredrik Christiansen recently completed the third photogrammetry field season on bowhead whales in Disko Bay, Greenland. See Thread.

🌐🌏🐋🧪

@FChristiansen.bsky.social

#marinemammology #ecology #cetaceanresearch
#Arctic #MarineEcology #Research
#Science

Our Senior Researcher Fredrik Christiansen completed the third photogrammetry field season on bowhead whales in Disko Bay, Greenland. Together with MSc student Oliver Nowak and local hunters, he measured over 500 whales during March to June to investigate their prey consumption and condition.

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Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · Jun 26

This work has been done in #Denmark with many folks at @marinemammalsau.bsky.social and NIRAS. Tusind Tak to the Danish Environmental Protection Agency and the Aage V. Jensen Naturfond for supporting research on the critically endangered Baltic harbour porpoise!

Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · Jun 26

In the video we are using a crane to lift the array lander overboard, while our crane operator, the trustworthy deck boss Artur, monitors an underwater camera to make sure the lander settles correctly on the seafloor. Then Line Kyhn takes a GPS point to mark the position.

Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · Jun 26

This week I'm out in the Danish #BalitcSea on the #SAMBAHII Project, working to monitor the remaining 500 Baltic #harborporpoise. Here, we are deploying a 4-channel array to calculate the #dectectionFunction, or the likelihood of detecting porpoise #echolocation in the study area.

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Reposted by Emily T Griffiths

Dr. Carly Kenkel @drcarl.bsky.social · May 15

Its that time again - the list of Ecology/Evolution/Marine Bio Labs recruiting grad students for Fall 2026 is live!
PIs enter your position info here: forms.gle/2XTHBP6CZGEn...
Prospective students (and PIs not recruiting) share the composite list: docs.google.com/spreadsheets...
Please share! 🧪

Ecology/Evolution/Marine Biology labs recruiting for Fall 2026

Please complete this form if you are a PI recruiting graduate students for a Fall 2026 start. If you are NOT recruiting, feel free to share the response sheet with prospective students looking for lab...

forms.gle

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Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · Jun 23

Bonfires are pretty, but I consider myself lucky to round out midsommer off the coast of Møns Klint.

Photo from sea looking at Møns Klint (Danish chalk cliffs) at sunset.

Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · Jun 11

Last week, @mialybkaer.bsky.social, Ellen Jacobs, and I traveled to @vliz.be as part of the @dtobioflow.bsky.social project! We got into the nitty gritty to bring #porpoise pod 🔊 data to the #DataLake via @aquatictracking.bsky.social. Very excited to make this #bigdata 🔢📈 project a reality.

Researchers from the Marine Mammal Research division at Aarhus University and the European Tracking Network group at the Flanders Marine Institute met in Begium at VLIZ to discussion our big data goals. Image is of 9 researchers standing outside in the wind in front of a building.

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Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · Jun 4

Often in first drafts I confuse my homophones and realize in the read-through I've used the wrong word. For example, here, I was trying to type pull the line taut, not taught.

However, what is with this grammar suggestion? What does 'train to the train' mean? How does it come from 'line taught?'

Small screenshot of Microsoft Word grammar suggestion of 'Pull the line taught' to 'train to the train.'

Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · May 23

Terrific work spearheaded by Mark Mikaelsen and Line Kyhn at NIRAS, with co-authors Sidsel Marie Nørholm (NIRAS), and at @marinemammalsau.bsky.social Signe Sveegaard, myself, and @beestfloris.bsky.social. Funding for this study was provided by #Energinet. Full report can be found here⤵️.
🧵6/fin

dce.au.dk

Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · May 23

It clear that more focus on the use and impact of USBL systems is needed, especially to keep the source level 🔊 as low as possible. Taken measures could be:

- maximum USBL source levels as a technical criteria 🚫

- requirements to avoid unexpected and undocumented in source level variations. 📝
🧵5/6

Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · May 23

Additionally, the amount of time before a porpoise would return to an area was positively correlated 📈 with USBL signals. Meaning, that if USBLs were detected at a station, porpoises would take longer to return after the geophysical survey was complete than if there had been no survey. 🧵4/6

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Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · May 23

Surprisingly, USBLs were detected at ALL stations (‼️), indicating that USBL signals are far more prevalent than what is currently reported. As for disturbance, the presence of USBLs had a significant negative correlation on the probability of porpoise positive minutes (PPM) detected. 🧵3/6

Bar plot with the results of the Control-Impact analyses on porpoise positive minutes (PPM). Model predicted mean and 95% CI intervals (in black) are provided for control and impact stations contrasting PPM between periods without USBL signals (blue bar), periods with USBL signals from other sources (orange bar) and USBL signals from survey vessels (red bar). The letters below the bars indicate whether the predicted mean between groups is significantly different at a p-value of 0.05. As such, bars with similar letters indicates that the mean PPM between groups do not differ from each other, while bars with different letters indicates that the mean PPM between groups differ from each other.

At the control stations, there is a significant difference between porpoise presence during unknown USBL activity (other sources) and without. At the impact stations, there is a significant difference between porpoise presence during known and unknown USBL activity, and without.

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Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · May 23

In collaboration with researchers at NIRAS, we at @marinemammalsau.bsky.social undertook a baseline study to understand the #USBL impact on porpoise presence in the #NorthSea. We had control and impact #PAM stations, where impact stations were within 3.5 km of known USBL survey activity. 🧵2/6

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Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · May 23

The prevalence of ultra short baseline acoustic position systems, also known as USBLs 🔊, is understudied in #EuropeanWaters and its effect on marine mammals 🐋, such as the #harbourPorpoise, is mostly unknown. These systems are used in #geophysicalSurveys and during #trawling fishing activities. 🧵1/6

Harbour porpoise surfacing in calm, northern water.

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Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · May 22

Interesting that you've chosen to block a leading expert on sperm whale communication in this thread.

Ideas like this can be harmful, as they shape the narrative in a human centric way. Whale culture and communication will not necessarily mirror our own. Think bigger.

Are we really about to talk to whales?

It’s certainly an exciting time to study communication in whales and dolphins.

theconversation.com

Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · May 22

It is very telling when sites leap to block experts that disagree with them!

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Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · May 21

Very curious to know how this captions the blocked 🚫 content 🤣

Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · May 20

Thanks for taking the time to reach out! I had a lot of fun making it. :)

Reposted by Emily T Griffiths

Luke Rendell @lrendell.bsky.social · May 16

Inspiring plenary from Joe Roman about 'lifting baselines' and quantifying the effects whale real red ecological pathways have on nutrient cycling and transfer in the oceans - check out his latest contribution here: www.nature.com/articles/s41... #ECSconference2025 🐋🦑🧪

Joe Roman in front of a title slide about to give an inspiring plenary

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Emily T Griffiths @emilytgriffiths.com · May 15

At #ECSconference2025 @crisbri.bsky.social made a compelling #BlueAnthropocene argument: that animals are living in a world heavily and historically influenced by us. #CulturalEcosystems require historical context.

Slide from a talk giving an overview of different cultures, both historical and modern, influence on wildlife.