Category: Blog & Field Reports

Thursday, 9 September, 7:00 PM ET (NYC, Miami – Zoom details below)

Spawning Patterns, Diet, Mercury, and Reasons Why Goliath Grouper Should be Protected In Perpetuity

In this Deep Dive, Chris Malinowski, a biologist who is passionate about conservation of marine and aquatic systems will discuss not dolphins, but a fish: the goliath grouper. The Atlantic Goliath Grouper (Epinephelus itajara), a large indigenous tropical reef fish, approached local extinction in U. S. waters by the 1980s as a result of intense fishing pressure. In 1990, federal and state laws intervened to protect this species.

Volume 25, Issue 3 is here!

Today, we share the last day observations from each student individually.

Victor: The morning was data but also a chance to say goodbye to the dolphins. I’m still not sure who is who but I can recognize 1 or 2 … especially Poli. The other highlight for me today was snorkeling in the afternoon at Bailey’s Key near the dolphin area. This made getting my covid test in Coxen Hole and away from the dolphins ok.

Alessandro: Today was a relaxing day. After the last data collection, we had one of the best snorkeling sessions around.

This morning, surprise! We collected data with Kathleen’s observations. The dolphins were a bit more active this morning compared to yesterday. We saw some breaching. And Bailey did a weird curved posture for Laura (see cover photo) while Stan did a “fluke-stand” for her. (Thank you, Laura).

The weather was better with sunshine and a slight breeze. Sometimes the dolphins were chasing each other at the surface. And, several dolphins paid a visit to platform 1 to try to entice us to play … away from our observations.

We did our morning observations and data collection. No sunrise this morning but a cloudy day and windy. And the dolphins were quiet, sleeping it seemed – maybe like a hangover in humans.

After breakfast, we prepared ourselves to get ready for our encounter and snorkel with the dolphins. We had more than Bailey during our encounter – French and Tilly were chasing each other and trying to swim between us. Tilly seemed to be hiding behind our legs watching for French.

Each student presents their summary of the day. The cover photo is Bailey playing with water – Thank you, Manon.

Laura: we woke up and we went to collect data at 6 AM. We did a great job and are more comfortable with the data collection. I’m focused and faster when I search for dolphins for the space use data collection. I also liked learning how to log the videotapes and how patience and focus are important when doing those analyses.

We woke up and prepared to collect morning surface observations and space use data from 6 am; actually, we took the water taxi at 6 am to Bailey’s Key. The dolphins were having weird zoomies across the lagoon. They were giving us a private show – there were numerous leaps and breaches and lots of vocal behavior. This was a small group near the palapa socializing (Thank you, Davide).

We are still working on our data collection techniques.

After breakfast, we had a class to learn about the DCP history and current research projects.

This morning was the UofB’s group’s first data collection session at Bailey’s Key. We had a long day today and so Manon and I are writing this night’s blog post. The dolphins were VERY social and the visibility was really good. Sandy and Champ spent quite a bit of time circling Kathleen and checking out her fins. And, French joined Kathleen after the session for a rubdown. Ronnie spent some time with Annalisa, Szonya, and Alessandro trying to get them to play with sea grass.

The CSU group had their last data collection/observation session this morning. The “cover” photo shows me collecting data and a student team on platform 3 with Shane observing from the west side of the lagoon. (Thank you for the photo, Marc!) Each of three student teams collected space use data and surface observations while I was collecting data with the MVA. It was a morning full of activity!

The panorama shot shows some of the surface activity while Marc watches from a finger dock and Alexa records data on the platform.

We got up early again and went to Bailey’s Key to do observations. And, before we could start with our space use data baseline, we saw a giant sting ray and an eagle ray in the dolphin enclosures. They did not seem to want to hang out with the dolphins …

Thank you Manon for the great eagle ray photo …

This morning was the smoothest day yet for space use data and surface observation data. They were VERY active. There was one dolphin breaching several times in Grid A3 space.