These "open mikes" picked up the ballads of the fin whale, blue whale, humpback whale, minke whale, sei whale, and the rare North Atlantic right whale, said Christopher Clark, Bioacoustics Research Program at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology in Ithaca, New York.
The fin, humpback, right, and sei whales are on the U.S. endangered species list, meaning the federal government considers them to be "on the brink of extinction."
But what amazed the team the most was not the types of whales heard, but the sheer density of animals spread out over the entire study area, said Aaron Rice, science director of the bioacoustics lab.
For one thing, the scientists were struck by the "juxtaposition of having such large charismatic animals that represent ocean biodiversity living right off of the largest city on the Atlantic coast," Rice said
Some of the whales cruised as close as 10 miles (16 kilometers) from New York City, he said.
Clark said, "If you were standing at the top of the Statue of Liberty and looked south or southeast, if you [could see] under the water, there were whales singing under the surface."
In some cases, it was the whales' distance both near and far from shore that surprised the researchers.
For instance, the recorders picked up songs of the North Atlantic right whale 70 miles (113 kilometers) from shore—where the coastal dweller isn't thought to venture.
The acoustic technology, however, does not yet allow the scientists to accurately estimate exactly how many whales they heard.
Science director Rice said, "Now that we know they are there, our next question is how many."
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