Samir Patel, senior research biologist with Coonamessett Farm Foundation, in Falmouth, is the lead author of a paper recently published in Scientific Reports. The paper examines how endangered leatherback sea turtles react to impulsive sounds, such as those created by underwater construction.
"The idea was to determine how all of the new sounds that are going to be created by the soundscape of construction and operation, and all of that associated with wind, would impact protected species," Patel explained.
While domestic offshore wind construction has largely ground to a halt under the Trump Administration, Patel says the research is applicable to other energy infrastructure, such as oil and gas platforms.
The federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management funded Patel’s research. The bureau was specifically interested in learning how impulsive noises, like underwater construction sounds, affect larger, migratory protected species.
Patel and his team tagged 13 leatherbacks in Nantucket Sound in the fall of 2023, while the turtles were gorging on their favorite food. They used suction cups to attach cameras and hydrophones to the turtles’ shells. Then they used a seismic survey tool, called a "sparker," to generate a sudden noise.
"We noticed that the leatherbacks actually reduced foraging," Patel said. So they were foraging at a very high clip, upwards of 300 jellyfish an hour. And they reduced forging by almost 65% during that sparker exposure period."
Patel says the turtles also shifted their dive pattern when exposed to the noise.
"They shifted their ... priorities a little bit to likely swimming away from the sparker – some avoidance behavior," he said. "They still did forage. You know, so that priority was still part of it, but a decline of 65% was pretty substantial."
Patel said his team's study of leatherbacks' behavior in the wild was the first of its kind. But, he said, it was limited in that only 13 turtles were involved, and for only a few hours at a time. He said further studies would need to be conducted in order to draw wider conclusions.
