Do humpback whales use ultrasound?

Question

Do humpback whales use ultrasound?

Answer 1

That depends on what you mean by ultrasound.  If, by ultrasound, you mean the ability to send out sound to see the  internal organs in other bodies, the answer is no, but all of the dolphins including the killer whale (Orcinas orca) have that ability, as do all of the other cetaceans that have teeth (Odontocetes).

The first time my late wife and I went swimming offshore in Southern California, the little common dolphin (Delphinus delphus) that had been hanging out with us almost immediately began ensonifying her abdomen, and we thought she might be pregnant.  Suddenly, there were dozens of common dolphins around us, all ensonifying her whole body, but mostly her abdomen.  

She wasn't pregnant.  A few months later she was dead of cancer of the pancreas, which had spread throughout her body, which the dolphins had seen as clearly as if she were made of glass.  The really strange part is that cancer of the pancreas is usually a horribly painful way to die, yet Anne never reported feeling any pain or any other symptoms until the night before she died.  I don't know what they did or how they did it, but I strongly suspect that those dolphins had everything to do with her painless passing.

Just because humpbacks and other baleen whales (Mysticeti) don't make echolocation clicks is no reason to believe they can't use ambient (background) sound learn everything they need to know about their surroundings.  If your sonar is good enough, you don't need pings, but pings, and the ability to focus them to a fine point, like sunlight through a magnifying glass, provide them with a weapon so powerful that it is as rude for any dolphin to point its head at another dolphin as it is to point a shot gun at someone.  That's why you always see dolphins swimming next to each other and never ever single file.

Answer 2

Humpback whales uses bubble nets as

acoustic waveguides to create a sonic trap for prey, Male humpback whales are known for their courtship songs, and both males and females are believed to use vocalizations while hunting for fish.

They form spiral bubble nets n trap the prey.whales form such nets, they emit very loud ‘trumpeting feeding calls’, the available recordings containing energy up to at least 4kHz.

This encourage the prey to remain within the bubble net, and so trap them ready for consumption.

For detailed info with pics download pdf from following link:

http://www.isvr.soton.ac.uk/STAFF/Pubs/p...