Bizarre Ocean ‘Buzzing’ Sound Is Solved By Experts

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The mystery of a ‘buzzing’ sound coming from deep in the Pacific Ocean has been solved by scientists.

Large parts of the ocean are humming with the sound of fish flatulence as they migrate to different depths looking for food and shelter.

The Mirror reports:

Marine experts believe they may have discovered the noise is linked to something very natural but just a little bit rude – fish farts – that happen at dusk and dawn.

While it’s surreal to think that the gassy noises can be picked up from the darkest recesses of the Pacific Ocean – it turns out that the fish are in fact humming – and not in a smelly way either.

Scientists have been probing the noises for many years after sending hydrophones down as far as 3,300 feet to explore the sounds.

Now biologists say they might have got to the bottom of it and it’s also linked to migration .

Underwater microphones are thrown over the side of ships or suspended from buoys and left to capture the noise.

When the tests began experts thought they’d capture humpback whales at mating time, dolphin clicks and other sounds.

But instead they found this puzzling background noise that sent them into a frenzy.

At 300 hertz and above it was so high and too steady to be a traditional reverberation, , according to NPR .

Now Simone Baumann-Pickering , a marine biologist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego says it’s a natural phenomenon that you’d least expect.

She said: “It’s known that some fish are considered to be farting, that they emit gas as they change depths in the water column.

“We’re just scratching the surface in terms of understanding how important sound is.” 

Countless fish are traversing the ocean every day making it hum as they go and their sum total weigh as much as 10 billion tonnes.

Baumann-Pickering added that the fish: “are truly, actively communicating — potentially to initiate migration.

And insists they might be saying: “it’s time to go.”

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