The acoustic calls of blue whales off California are described with visual
observations of behavior and with acoustic tracking. Acoustic call data wit
h corresponding position tracks are analyzed for five calling blue whales d
uring one 100-min time period. Three of the five animals produced type A-B
calls while two produced another call type which we refer to as type D. One
of the animals producing the A-B call type was identified as male. Pauses
in call production corresponded to visually observed breathing intervals. T
here was no apparent coordination between the calling whales. The average c
all source level was calculated to be 186 dB re: 1 mu Pa at 1 m over the 10
-110-Hz band for the type B calls. On two separate days, female blue whales
were observed to be silent during respective monitoring periods of 20 min
and 1 h. (C) 2001 Acoustical Society of America.