--- title: Whale Sounds: Marine Animals May Communicate Differently description: Whales at different spots around the globe communicate with different variations of the sound, an analogue to human dialects. canonical: https://time.com/4027112/whale-dialects/ author: Justin Worland article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-09-09T18:58:02.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:41:35.364Z article:section: Science og:title: Whales Have Dialects Just Like Humans, Study Finds og:description: Whales in different locations make slightly different sounds to communicate og:url: https://time.com/4027112/whale-dialects/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb942741a5232905e/698862d45f570f5d92b1d4bd/whale.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 5220 og:image:height: 2936 og:image:alt: Whale og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Whales Have Dialects Just Like Humans, Study Finds twitter:description: Whales in different locations make slightly different sounds to communicate twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltb942741a5232905e/698862d45f570f5d92b1d4bd/whale.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Whales Have Dialects Just Like Humans, Study Finds > Sponsored content. 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Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-network-2026q3/newsletters?i=1f46972f-1c05-4e85-8780-26faf2ba92e9&cr=time-nl-network-2026q3-v1) ## Video: Waking the Dead: Bringing Extinct Species Back to Life [Watch (HLS stream): Waking the Dead: Bringing Extinct Species Back to Life](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/7mURxfr4.m3u8) (4:03)  _Published 2014-03-12. Conservationists and scientists have a saying, "extinction is forever." But soon biologists will clone long-gone animals in the hope to redefine that axiom to "DE-extinction is forever."_  by [Justin Worland](https://time.com/author/justin-worland/)  ## Justin Worland Senior Correspondent Sep 9, 2015 6:58 PM UTC  Humpback-whale-tail Humpback-whale-tail Monica and Michael Sweet—Getty Images/Flickr RF  by [Justin Worland](https://time.com/author/justin-worland/)  ## Justin Worland Senior Correspondent Sep 9, 2015 6:58 PM UTC Whale researchers and enthusiasts have long known about the loud clicking sounds made by the marine mammal to communicate. Now, new research shows how whales at different spots around the globe communicate with different variations of the sound, an analogue to human dialects. Researchers tracked groups of whales during a series of 2 to 4–week trips between 1985 and 2003, recording both images and sound. The [study](https://time.com/wp-admin/post-new.php), published in the journal _Nature Communications_, suggests that the dialects emerged as a result of cultural learning similar to the processes that humans undergo. These experiences and differences play a key role in the formation of culture and differentiate one group from another, according to the study. Still, the difference in dialects confounded researchers given the lack of physical barriers in the ocean. “Providing evidence that the processes generating the complex and diverse cultures in human populations could also be at play in non-human societies is a crucial step towards evaluating the contrasts and convergences between human and non-human cultures,” researchers wrote. ### 26 of LIFE’s Best Animal Covers  February 8, 1937 LIFE Magazine cover (photo by Charles J. Belden). LIFE Magazine  March 1, 1937 LIFE Magazine cover (photo by Henry M. Lester). 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LIFE Magazine ## Transcript [ SOUND ] [ MUSIC ] My name is Stuart Brand and I was trained as an ecologist. Conservation is about to take a turn because the technology was gonna allow us to use the DNA that's in the museum specimens and fossils to bring back extinct species [ MUSIC ] The passenger pigeon was around for 6 million years. And people remembered how amazing it was that these animals darkened the sky for hours at a time. There's these stories about these giant flocks blocking out the sun. And their wings sounding louder than thunder. We developed the techniques to hunt and net these birds and basically killed them all. And then it was really gone. When I was growing up, my mother said when the last one died in 1914 it broke America's heart. It was one of the prideful things that America had to show the world, and it was gone. This book. This is essentially the bible of passenger pigeon. I am currently the lead researcher for the deextinction project to bring the extinct passenger pigeon back to life. When I say, oh, we'll bring back a passenger pigeon, everyone goes, oh, my god, that's like Jurassic Park. And no, no, it's not. Not at all. Our scientists have done things which nobody's ever done before. Yeah, yeah, but your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn't stop to think if they should. I don't think a pigeon is going to, you know, pluck lawyers off of toilets. No. [ SOUND ]. Aah! [ BLANK_AUDIO ] So how we're actually going to go about deextinction. Every organism has a unique code in their genes. This one would be good I think. So these are actual DNA codes. From a chunk of a passenger pigeon foot. Now, if you can get DNA, then we can actually make it into a living cell. We're going to sequence its whole genome. We're gonna build from scratch the code that is a passenger pigeon, one gene at a time. Compare it to its closest relative. [ MUSIC ] Then we're gonna introduce DNA into the living cell of a band- tailed pigeon. And when you introduce an extinct animal's egg cell into a new mother, then you've changed the game. [ MUSIC ] Which has been done. The extinct Iranian Ibex was successfully cloned. That was the first deextinction. In this particular case, the animal only lived about ten minutes, but it was a proof of concept, and with further efforts, we hope, followed by everything from the passenger pigeon to the Tasmanian tiger. It's one of the most famous human- caused extinctions in the world. Benjamin, the last Tasmanian tiger, died in 1936. It was our direct activity that caused that extinction. For me, biotech is the future of conservation because our meddling is not unnatural. It is what species do. One of the things that gotten used to is the horrifying realization that extinction is forever. 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