by Eliza with Samuel, Oscar and, Henry

Today we explored the sounds of the Salish Sea. During our second day at Salish Sea Sciences, students learned how to record acoustics using a new program called Audacity. We began by going around the dorm recording different sounds in order to get used to the software. After that we made our way over to Jason and Sam at the Sea Mammal Research Unit’s Engineering team where they explained their work which focuses on the development and deployment of hydrophone equipped buoys. The goal with these hydrophones(a kind of e special underwater microphone) is to see how different noise levels from boats affect the way marine mammals hear and communicate with each other. They then told us how the sound itself is measured, in a unit known as decibels. This is how they determine the volume of different sounds made by things such as marine mammals and boats. Then equipped with this new knowledge all of the students went out to different spots to see who could record a spot in town with the most noise. When we returned to the lab we all worked in groups to convert our data into decibels. From that we determined that the intersection at spring street and pine was the loudest spot during our minute long recording although it could have easily been the airport if a plane was landing during the time which just goes to show the variability in one area’s soundscape. After that we shared delicious meal of spanakopita and salad prepared by Elsbeth, Jonathan, William and, Denny and then listened to Ayla’s presentation about her experiences at Salish Sea Sciences and as a Stanford student.