Editing Leopard seal (section)

===Acoustic behavior===
{{Further|Animal communication|Mating call}}
Leopard seals are very vocal underwater during the austral summer.<ref name="Rogers TL, Ciaglia MB, Klinck H, Southwell C 2013 e52542"/> The male seals produce loud calls (153 to 177 dB 1 μPa at 1 m) for many hours each day.<ref>{{cite journal|author= Rogers TL |year=2014|title= Source levels of the underwater calls of a male leopard seal |journal= The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America|volume=136|issue=4|pages= 1495–1498|doi=10.1121/1.4895685|pmid=25324053|bibcode=2014ASAJ..136.1495R}}</ref> While singing the seal hangs upside down and rocks from side to side under the water. Their back is bent, the neck and cranial thoracic region (the chest) is inflated and as they call their chest pulses. The male calls can be split into two categories: vocalizing and silencing; vocalizing is when they are making noises underwater, and silencing noted{{clarify|date=February 2024}} as the breathing period at the air surface.<ref name=":2">{{Cite journal|last1=Rogers|first1=Tracey L.|last2=Cato|first2=Douglas H.|date=2002|title=Individual Variation in the Acoustic Behaviour of the Adult Male Leopard Seal, Hydrurga leptonyx|jstor=4535987|journal=Behaviour|volume=139|issue=10|pages=1267–1286|doi=10.1163/156853902321104154}}</ref> Adult male leopard seals have only a few stylized calls, some are like bird or [[Cricket (insect)|cricket]]-like [[wikt:trill|trill]]s yet others are low haunting [[wikt:moan|moan]]s.<ref name="Rogers, T. L., Cato, D. H., & Bryden, M. M. 1996 414–427">{{cite journal|author= Rogers, T. L.|author2= Cato, D. H.|author3= Bryden, M. M.|name-list-style= amp |year=1996|title= Behavioral significance of underwater vocalizations of captive leopard seals, Hydrurga leptonyx.|journal= Marine Mammal Science|volume=12|issue=3|pages=414–427|doi=10.1111/j.1748-7692.1996.tb00593.x|bibcode= 1996MMamS..12..414R}}</ref> Scientists have identified five distinctive sounds that male leopard seals make, which include: the high double trill, medium single trill, low descending trill, low double trill, and a hoot with a single low trill. These cadences of calls are believed to be a part of a long range acoustic display for territorial purposes, or to attract a potential mate.<ref name=":2" />

The leopard seals have age-related differences in their calling patterns, just like birds. The younger male seals have many different types of variable calls, but the mature male seals have only a few, highly stylized calls.<ref>{{cite journal|author= Rogers, T. L|year=2007|title= Age-related differences in the acoustic characteristics of male leopard seals, Hydrurga leptonyx|journal= The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America|volume=122|issue=1|pages=596–605|doi=10.1121/1.2736976|pmid=17614516|bibcode=2007ASAJ..122..596R}}</ref> Each male leopard seal produces these individual calls, and can arrange their few call types into individually distinctive sequences (or songs).<ref>{{cite journal|author1=Rogers, Tracey L. |author2=Cato, Douglas H. |year=2002|title=Individual Variation in the Acoustic Behaviour of the Adult Male Leopard Seal, ''Hydrurga leptonyx''|journal=Behaviour|volume=139|issue=10|pages=1267–1286|jstor=4535987|doi=10.1163/156853902321104154}}</ref> The acoustic behavior of the leopard seal is believed to be linked to their breeding behaviour. In male seals, vocalizing coincides with the timing of their [[breeding season]], which falls between November and the first week of January; captive female seals vocalize when they have elevated [[reproductive hormone]]s.<ref name="Rogers, T. L., Cato, D. H., & Bryden, M. M. 1996 414–427"/> Conversely, a female leopard seal can attribute{{clarify|date=February 2024}} calls to their environment as well; however, usually it is to gain the attention of a pup, after getting back from a forage for food.