Ocean Alliance began working with drones in 2013. Within the last few years, they began collecting exhaled breath condensation, also known as “whale snot.”

The whale snot is a biological jackpot with DNA, microbiomes, and hormones. This data was nearly impossible to collect from a live whale.

“I’ve seen more unique behaviors from a drone in the last five years than I’ve seen in the previous 25,” Kerr said.

They’re apparently also using the drones to tag them for GPS tracking, really cool use for them.