[bbfan1991]

He may have looked like the strong, silent type but Noc the white whale had quite a mouth on him. Like Willie the Whale, the opera-singing star of Disney’s 1946 cartoon, the mammal could mimic human sounds – but he appeared to have a short temper.



A diver who once entered his enclosure surfaced soon after to ask bemused colleagues: ‘Who told me to get out?’

Noc spent 30 years among dolphins and other white whales at the National Marine Mammal Foundation before his death five years ago.

Researchers have now released recordings that reveal the human-like sound of Noc’s ‘voice’.

Dr Sam Ridgway, who lead the research, said his team first noticed unusual sounds near the whale and dolphin enclosure in San Diego, California, in 1984. They described the sound as like two people having a conversation in the distance.

Dr Ridgway said: ‘Our observations suggest that the whale had to modify its vocal mechanics in order to make the speech-like sounds. Such obvious effort suggests motivation for contact.

‘Whale voice prints were similar to the human voice and unlike the whale’s usual sounds. The sounds we heard were clearly an example of vocal learning by the white whale.’

Unlike humans, whales make sounds through their nasal tract, not the larynx. To ‘talk’, Noc had to vary the pressure in his nasal tract while adjusting specific muscles and inflating part of his blowhole, Dr Ridgway’s team found.

http://soundcloud.com/metrouk/noc-the-whale-talks