Hot, Hot, Hot – with dolphins aplenty!
Our day began with a several sightings of bottlenose dolphins. The individuals and groups were easy to see since we had glass calm seas and great visibility. We had 8 encounters today and observed several dolphins that we could readily identify. Leftpec (#115) is an adult female with a distinct noth out of the leading edge of her left pectoral fin. We saw her and a group of calves several times today. We also sawm with and recorded a group of 6-7 adult females, two of which appeared pregnant. These were two females we have seen each year since 1991: Sadie (#60) and #45. It was great to see them and know that they are healthy and thriving (or so it seemed). They were slowly swimming and not too interested or inquisitive about us. Maybe they had just eaten and were relaxing … We also observed a group of seven spotted dolphins with one bottlenose dolphin. The latter had faint spots along the sides of her belly … maybe she is a hybrid between the two species? Of the spotted dolphins, one was #93 (Rebecca) – we last saw her in 1997 as a juvenile. This year she was a subadult and had a calf of her own. It is amazing to watch the new generations appear. Almost like watching a family grow and expand. I gathered more than an hour of video and we observed dolphins for more than 2.5 hours under water today. We were all quite tired by night fall. Hopefully tomorrow will offer similar opportunities for observations and data collection. Cheers Kathleen