读者精选:鯨魚也有流行樂！研究：鯨魚的「芭樂歌」也會傳遍全球

鮑蓉蓉

2011年4月15日 11:34

座頭鯨也有「芭樂歌」，平均一首在澳洲「發行」的歌，2年之後才會傳到太平洋中間的法屬波利尼西亞。（圖／擷取自網路）

記者鮑蓉蓉／編譯 

女神卡卡只要推出一首朗朗上口的歌，可能不到幾天就傳佈全球，那鯨魚呢？科學家最新的發現指出，鯨魚間也有「芭樂歌」，平均一首在澳洲「發行」的歌，2年之後才會傳到太平洋中間的法屬波利尼西亞。這項研究刊登在「當代生物學」（Current Biology）期刊上。 

來自澳洲昆士蘭大學的研究人員艾倫葛蘭（Ellen Garland）表示，許多海洋專家很訝異在動物王國裡發現如此廣大的「文化交流」。 

公的座頭鯨（Humpback whale）一向以牠們交配時所哼的歌著稱，除了內容複雜以外，牠們的歌曲也相當冗長且大聲。科學家仍不確定公座頭鯨哼歌的原因，但有可能是為了吸引異性，或是為了相互聯絡。 

牠們的一首歌平均長達20分鐘左右，公座頭鯨還可以連續高唱24小時；也曾有一度，同一個群組裡的公鯨魚都唱著同一首歌，相當驚人。 

而在這項最新的研究當中，葛蘭指出，座頭鯨的「流行樂」隨著時間更迭，且規模相當大，每一首歌會像漣漪一樣，從一個團體傳播至另一個團體，相互學習「新歌」。 

葛蘭指出，在不同團體間遷移的座頭鯨或許就是幫忙「宣傳新歌」的來源，而大部分的新歌都是「舊瓶換新酒」，就是舊歌中帶上一些新旋律，不過偶爾也有全新的歌曲出現。 

研究人員推斷，哼唱新旋律對牠們來說別有意義，或許是為了求新、求變、求突出，以讓牠們可以吸引更多異性，但有時候也要跟一下流行，不一起唱新歌就落伍了！





Researchers at The University of Queensland have found that male humpback whales ‘change their tune' every year during their migration across the Pacific. 

A study on whale song published today in the US journal, Current Biology, reveals a striking pattern of cultural change over a large distance, with the rate, scale and repetition unmatched in non-human culture. 

UQ PhD student Ellen Garland said 11 different humpback whale song types were identified, which typically started in the eastern Australian population and spread in a step-wise fashion across the region to French Polynesia. 

“I noticed that the songs moved quite rapidly through the six populations, usually taking two years to spread all the way across the region,” she said. 

“This can compare to the game of Chinese whispers, except the song appears to be transmitted with little changes unlike a human sentence in the game.” 

Ms Garland said songs had spread across whale populations suggesting acoustic contact or male dispersal between populations in the region. 

“The reason we believe the song tends to travel east is because the eastern Australian population is the largest in the region and has a greater influence than the smaller Oceania ones,” she said. 

Previous research has revealed that only male humpback whales sing and that song is a behaviour used in courtship and mating. 

Ms Garland said all of the males in a population sang a similar song, but it was continually changing and evolving over time. 

“Song can undergo evolutionary change, which occurs over a long period of time, or revolutionary change, where the males start singing a completely new song,” she said. 

“We believe the song is continually changing because the males wish to be novel or slightly different to the male singing next to them. 

“The way whales change their song can be compared to how humans follow fashion trends – someone starts a new trend and before you know it everyone starts wearing the same thing.” 

The study is the first documentation of a repeated, dynamic cultural change occurring across multiple humpback whale populations across a large geographical scale. 

It was undertaken in collaboration with the South Pacific Whale Research Consortium and investigated song similarity over an 11-year period within the South Pacific region focusing on the populations of eastern Australia, New Caledonia, Tonga, American Samoa, the Cook Islands and French Polynesia.