"And right here is a photo of a Northern Bottlenose Whale...which basically looks like a penis," said the Australian staff member.
*giggle*
"And they can get to be pretty big," she continued.
Of course, I had to ask, "The penis or the whale?"
I'm going to Hell. But at least the group laughed.
"This time it's the whale. Now, moving on to the Sperm Whale..."
Not too long ago we returned from another day out at sea, and I'm very pleased to inform you that we had calm waters, on-and-off clear skies, and FINALLY had a glorious dolphin encounter. Those suckers played mind tricks on us so we couldn't keep count of how many were surrounding the boat. But regardless, we got quite a show and I was fortunate enough to catch most of it on film without allowing the water to destroy my camera. They were playing, fighting, performing water acrobatics and synchronized swimming, swimming alongside the boat as close as 10-15 feet, etc. I'm not even kidding. I even had a chance to film them up on the front deck.
This whole experience begs the following question: Who needs a day at Seaworld when Mother Nature can provide you a free show, especially without animal abuse?
Anyway, you might be wondering, "At what point does the 'research' part come into play?" Well, the procedure begins when each of us looks in a separate direction to locate a splash or "blow" out of a blowhole. When someone sees either of these, he/she shouts the direction (e.g. "One-o'-clock!") and extends an arm out in that direction without looking anywhere else. Then whoever has a camera needs to wait till the cetacean comes to the surface so he/she can photograph the dorsal fin. This is for identification purposes.
This process is repeated while counting how many cetaceans are found in a group, or "pod." This is for population tracking, and as mentioned before, this part was difficult for us because the dolphins were incredibly energized. But in the end, we discovered a new calf and possibly a pregnant female, which is very good news*, especially because the Moray Firth (the portion of the North Sea where these creatures are being studied) is only one of two conservations in the UK for cetaceans.
When enough data has been collected, the team returns to the base/office, uploads the photos, and compares them to previous photos to see if there have been any population changes, differences in dorsal fin scars (the males especially have these from fighting), etc. The team also looks over the route taken to find these pods, which I'm guessing is for migration purposes.
There's a lot more to it, but the purpose of this blog is to be entertaining. So I will leave you with this information for now.
*Dolphin Threats
