Facts in a Bottle

Hey Team!

So keeping with a feature of this blog, here are 15 facts on most people's favourite cetacean, the bottlenose dolphin!

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1. Their scientific name is Tursiops truncatus, named for the shape of their teeth
2. They are one of the most well known cetacean species, due to their exposure in aquaria and in film
3. They live in groups called pods, with a "fission/fusion" social system.
4. The "fission/fusion" system describes one where there is a well defined population, but not all individuals will be see together at all times.
5. Small, more permanent groups can arise, like mom/calf pairs and male pairs.
6. Male pairs are affectionately called "bromances". Two or three adult males will be seen swimming and and acting together in call aspects of life. They can last for a few months up to a lifetime.
7. They have some strange... |mating rituals". A male pair (or trio) will approach a female, separate her from the group, mate with her (both of them), then return her to the group. This sometimes reminds us of inappropriate human behaviour, and we have nicknamed it such.
8. All cetaceans can be identified by individuals in a particular manner. Bottlenose dolphins, like other dolphins, can be identified easily by their dorsal fins.
9. Bottlenose dolphins can be somewhat violent towards each other in play, mating and aggressiveness. Therefore they can get a lots of scratches and scars.
10. These scars, scratches, nicks and notches are usually permanent, and on the dorsal fin can be used to identify dolphins as individuals.
11. Just like a human's fingerprint, no two dolphin fins are the same in size, shape and natural markings!
12. Like other small cetaceans (mostly toothed whales), bottlenose dolphins use echolocation to get around underwater.
13.  Echolocation deals with sound waves, so dolphins are able to "hear" the world around them, or even cooler... "see in sound". That's kind of cool.
14. Although their common name isn't "the common dolphin" (which does exist), they are the most well known dolphin, courtesy of movies and films like Flipper and Dolphin Tale.
15. not only are bottlenose dolphins intelligent enough to do flips and tricks on command, they are also intelligent enough to use tools for foraging! There are a lot of documented cases of dolphins using sea sponges to root around the ocean floor for food.

Enjoy your day!

There you go, a couple more facts for your cetacean knowledge!

Speak Loud!