The crew of a marine research voyage have disembarked in Northland with huge smiles on their faces.
The Far Out Ocean Research Collective team is made up of marine mammal and seabird specialists and they were on a mission to survey the ocean life in the South Pacific Ocean.
They found more than they bargained for and are absolutely stoked about it.
Listen to the full interview
Marine ecologist Dr Tom Brough from Niwa was one of the scientists on the survey journey and he joined Emile Donovan to explain why it was such an exciting trip.
Brough says the team looks at ocean ecosystems that are just off the horizon where coastal vessels don’t go.
“This kind of habitat is really unsurveyed, we don’t have much knowledge about what’s out there. The basic principle of the voyage was to understand what kind of species live in this environment.”
The team were working in an area called the Northland Plateau off the coast of Northland which hasn’t been systematically surveyed before.
“We found some really interesting sightings of species that are very poorly known both in New Zealand and an international context.”
They saw a very large group of sperm whales with females and juveniles which is a rare thing to see in New Zealand.
They also got confirmation that they had sighted a beaked whale.
“It’s certainly the only time, to our knowledge, they’ve been seen alive in New Zealand and probably only among a handful of confirmed sightings in the world.”
While it’s exciting to see these species in New Zealand waters, it could also reflect changing ecosystems due to warming waters.
“That’s another part of our mission, to try to establish some of baseline information on what’s there now in order to understand how that might be changing under the impacts of climate change.”