Glossary

Abbreviations and Acronyms

SAM: Static Acoustic Monitoring refers to the practice of using fixed hydrophones to detect and record sounds, such as cetacean clicks and buzzes. 

POD: Porpoise Detector. The term POD can refer to either C- or T-PODs. PODs are automated static acoustic monitoring units that detect odontocete echolocation and record frequency, duration and bandwidth of each click. PODs are a relatively cost effective way of collecting long term data sets on cetacean habitat use. They are usually moored to the sea bed and can collect acoustic data over periods of several months, automatically detecting and recording any sounds that fall into a set frequency.

C-POD:  a C-POD is the digital successor of the T-POD. Like the T-POD it is an automated static acoustic monitoring unit that detects echolocation. It detects broader-band clicks and collects a much wider range of data to advance species identification

T-POD: a T-POD is an automated static acoustic monitoring unit that detects echolocation, recording frequency, duration and bandwidth of odontocete clicks. Although it is no longer in production, it is still widely in use. 

Hydrophone array: Several hydrophones arranged in a fixed special setting. Measuring the time of arrival differences from a sound recorded on the hydrophones allows to compute the position of the sound source.

Zoological terms

Cetacean: whales, dolphins and porpoises 

Echolocation: echolocation is a biological sonar system used extensively by odontocetes and bats and is primarily used in foraging and navigation. Cetaceans echolocate by emitting high frequency clicks and listening for the echoes to bounce back off surrounding objects and structures, which allows them to gather information about their surroundings. The gas filled swim bladder of fish, for example, effectively reflects echoes allowing cetaceans to quickly close in on their prey.

Odontocete: a suborder of cetaceans, also called 'toothed whales', including all dolphin and porpoise species, beaked whales and sperm whales