Why the US military is listening to shrimp

Why the US military is listening to shrimp Paul Starosta/Getty Images When pistol shrimps snap their claws, they can create the loudest sound made by any creature on Earth Military sonar can have a serious effect on some ocean animals. Marty Melville/AFP via Getty Images Military sonar is thought to be one of the factors which causes some whale species to fatally beach themselves The team is focusing on alert calls, much like listening out for a guard dog barking at intruders, says Cherubin. "A single shrimp snap is much quieter than a traditional sonar source, but there can be thousands of snaps happening per minute." JaysonPhotography/Getty Images The booming territorial calls of goliath groupers can act like an underwater bark of a dog that can alert anyone listening to intruders "One of the biggest challenges we've faced is dealing with the huge amount of noise created by the shrimp themselves and the reflections of all of those sounds off of the surrounding area," says Laferriere. Tuning in to the sounds made by normal marine life would give researchers a low-cost, environmentally friendly way of tracking the impact of human activities underwater "These low-impact, observational systems can be deployed to many different environments without disrupting the ecosystem nature has established," says Adornato.