Research
SUPPORTING ACADEMIC RESEARCH
Gentle Giants has good cooperation with the University of Iceland's Research Centre in Húsavík, offering our boats as a platform for marine biology research. Feel free to ask about their research if you see them on board.
TOURISM AS SCIENCE
Help tell the story of these magnificent animals!
Have you been out at sea with us? Did you get that much dreamt of shot of a humpback whale’s flukes (tail) as it raised it out of the water just before leaving for a dive?
YES! But did you know these photos can actually support research?
When it comes to our beloved humpback whales, every tail tells a tale: the black and white patterns on the underside of the whales’ flukes are as unique as our fingerprints – making it possible to identify them all as individuals.
Photo: Vittoria Sesani (Guide)
Iceland's Marine and Freshwater Research Institute (MFRI) runs the Whale Photo Identification Database of Iceland. The catalogue comprises a collection of known humpback whale individuals since 1980 and has been made available for public access to share information and increase knowledge.
While a lot of the data is gathered by MFRI surveys and by various partners/contributors, it is now also possible to contribute as an individual and share ID suitable photos.
Happywhale is an online platform, which was founded in 2015 and encourages whale watchers to take part in research and share their flukes photos in order to count, track and collect data of individual humpback whales.
On their website, you can submit your photos. Once the team of Happywhale has identified your humpback whale, they will track your whale around the globe and you are able to follow its journey from home!
An example from Happywhale – do you recognise the whale from above, photographed by our guide Vittoria?
