DOI: 10.6076/d1ws32
title: Spatial and temporal separation of toothed whales in the western North Atlantic

description: A diverse group of toothed whale species inhabits the pelagic habitats of
 the western North Atlantic, competing for overlapping prey resources.
 Historical data deficits have limited fundamental research into many of
 these species, such as establishing baselines of distribution and
 abundance, so their occurrence and habitat use patterns are not well
 characterized. Periodic cycles in activity have been reported at a range
 of temporal scales for odontocetes in other regions, such as seasonal
 movements, foraging activity modulated by lunar cycles, and diel activity
 patterns. A variety of spatial, temporal, and behavioral separation
 strategies have also been observed among predator guilds in both marine
 and terrestrial systems, and these may also contribute to ob served
 spatiotemporal patterns in activity. Re cently, passive acoustic data has
 been applied to monitor odontocete species continuously, with im proved
 detection and species discrimination for some cryptic species. We used a
 long-term passive acoustic data set collected at sites spanning the
 western North Atlantic shelf-break region to quantify presence and
 characterize seasonal, lunar, and diel activity patterns for 10 species.
 Our re sults demonstrated strong regional preferences and clear patterns
 of spatiotemporal separation between species with similar foraging
 ecology. Latitudinal shifts in seasonal presence peaks may suggest
 meridional seasonal migrations for some dolphin species. We also observed
 strong diel activity patterns that were modulated by both seasonal and
 lunar cycles. This study reveals complex behavioral patterns arising in
 response to natural cycles playing out over multiple temporal scales and
 provides new in sights into habitat partitioning among toothed whale
 species.
description: Time series of labeled odontocete echolocation clicks were
 derived by (1) from a large passive acoustic data set collected through repeated mooring deployments. Clicks were detected and classified to species using a machine learning workflow, and then classification error was quantified by manual verification of a subset of the labeled data. For each species/group we binned the time series of labeled clicks into 5-minute time bins, then scaled the number of clicks per bin by recording effort as well as the classifier error rates which were calculated on a per-species per-deployment basis. For analysis of temporal patterns in species presence and activity, we considered binomial presence/absence in each 5-minute bin to be a more reliable metric of species presence than the actual number of clicks labeled to that species, since some clicks were isolated by the clustering algorithm and therefore were unavailable to be labeled by the classifier. To remove spurious presence bins based on very few detections, we set a minimum number of clicks per bin threshold to be considered “presence”: ≥50 clicks per 5-minute bin for delphinid species, and ≥20 clicks per 5-minute bin for beaked whales, sperm whales, and Kogia spp. These values were selected based on consideration of the click-production rates and group sizes of these species, but are essentially arbitrary. 
description: Odontocete species acoustic presence was detected and classified
 at the 11 western North Atlantic passive acoustic monitoring sites using a
 combination of automated methods and manual review, as detailed in (1) and (2). Each of these .csv files contains information on the acoustic presence of a single odontocete species/group, given in the file name, at each of the acoustic monitoring sites (listed above in this README file). The temporal granularity is 5-minute bins. The first column of each file gives the time stamps of all 5-minute bins spanning the study period (1 May, 2016 to 30 April, 2019). Subsequent columns correspond to species' acoustic presence at each of the acoustic monitoring sites, as indicated by the site name abbreviation in the column header, ordered from north to south. The values in each cell indicate the number of echolocation clicks labeled as the given species in a particular time bin at a particular site. These values have been scaled by both effort and classifier species- and deployment-specific false positive rates, often resulting in fractional click counts. Cells containing "NaN" correspond to periods of no effort, such as when there were gap between successive recording device deployments at a given site.
description: # Spatial and temporal separation of toothed whales in the western North
 Atlantic **Access this dataset on Dryad:** https://doi.org/10.6076/D1WS32
 **Authors:** *Name:* Rebecca E. Cohen (point of contact) *Affiliation:* K.
 Lisa Yang Center for Conservation Bioacoustics, Cornell Lab of
 Ornithology, Cornell University Scripps Institution of Oceanography,
 University of California San Diego *Address:* Ithaca, NY *Email:*
 r.cohen@cornell.edu *Name:* Kaitlin E. Frasier *Affiliation:* Scripps
 Institution of Oceanography, University of California San Diego *Name:*
 Simone Baumann-Pickering *Affiliation:* Scripps Institution of
 Oceanography, University of California San Diego *Name:* John A.
 Hildebrand *Affiliation:* Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University
 of California San Diego **Dates of data collection:** May 2016 - April
 2019 **Geographic location of data collection:** | Site | Lat | Lon |
 Depth (m) | | ---- | --- | --- | --------- | | Heezen Canyon (HZ) |
 41.06°N | 66.35°W | 890 | | Oceanographer’s Canyon (OC) | 40.23°N |
 67.98°W | 450/880 | | Nantucket Canyon (NC) | 39.83°N | 69.98°W | 900 | |
 Babylon Canyon (BC) | 39.19°N | 72.23°W | 1000 | | Wilmington Canyon (WC)
 | 38.37°N | 73.37°W | 1040 | | Norfolk Canyon (NFC) | 37.16°N | 74.47°W |
 1110 | | Hatteras (HAT) | 35.30°N | 74.88°W | 1210 | | Gulf Stream (GS) |
 33.67°N | 76.00°W | 930 | | Blake Plateau (BP) | 32.11°N | 77.09°W | 950 |
 | Blake Spur (BS) | 30.58°N | 77.39°W | 1050 | | Jacksonville (JAX) |
 30.28°N | 80.22°W | 750 | **Funding sources that supported the collection
 of the data:** HDR MSA 1000300000780 (JAH) Duke University – Subcontract
 Number 283-0280 Duke to UC (JAH) NOAA NEFSC - CIMEC Award NA10OAR4320156
 (JAH)[https://doi.org/10.6076/D1WS32](https://doi.org/10.6076/D1WS32)
 <br> ## Description of the data and file structure **File List:** 1.
 Blainville\_5minBin.csv 2. Cuvier\_5minBin.csv 3. Gervais\_5minBin.csv 4.
 Kogia\_5minBin.csv 5. RissoGg1\_5minBin.csv 6. RissoGg2\_5minBin.csv 7.
 ShortBeakedCommonDolphin\_5minBin.csv 8.
 ShortFinnedPilotWhale\_5minBin.csv 9. Sowerby\_5minBin.csv 10.
 SpermWhale\_5minBin.csv 11. True\_5minBin.csv **Data description:**
 Odontocete species acoustic presence was detected and classified at the 11
 western North Atlantic passive acoustic monitoring sites using a
 combination of automated methods and manual review, as detailed in
 [(1)](https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0264988) and
 [(2)](https://doi.org/10.3354/meps14396). Each of these .csv files
 contains information on the acoustic presence of a single odontocete
 species/group, given in the file name, at each of the acoustic monitoring
 sites (listed above in this README file). The temporal granularity is
 5-minute bins. The first column of each file gives the time stamps of all
 5-minute bins spanning the study period (1 May, 2016 to 30 April, 2019).
 Subsequent columns correspond to species' acoustic presence at each
 of the acoustic monitoring sites, as indicated by the site name
 abbreviation in the column header, ordered from north to south. The values
 in each cell indicate the number of echolocation clicks labeled as the
 given species in a particular time bin at a particular site. These values
 have been scaled by both effort and classifier species- and
 deployment-specific false positive rates, often resulting in fractional
 click counts. Cells containing "NaN" correspond to periods of no
 effort, such as when there were gap between successive recording device
 deployments at a given site. ## Sharing/Access information **Licenses:**
 These data are licensed under a CC0 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0) Public Domain
 Dedication license. **Links to publications that cite or use the data:**
 Cohen, R.E., Frasier, K.E., Baumann-Pickering, S., Hildebrand, J.A. 2023.
 Spatial and temporal separation of toothed whales in the western North
 Atlantic. Marine Ecology Progress Series, 720: 1-4.
 https://www.int-res.com/abstracts/meps/v720/feature/ **Was data derived
 from another source?** Yes **Source:** Cohen, R.E., Frasier, K.E.,
 Baumann-Pickering, S., Wiggins, S.M., Rafter, M.A., Baggett, L.M.,
 Hildebrand, J.A. 2022. Identification of western North Atlantic odontocete
 echolocation click types using machine learning and spatiotemporal
 correlates. PLoS ONE 17(3): e0264988.
 https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0264988