Dolphin Swimming

My name is iiiuuiiiioo

// June 23rd, 2009 // View Comments // Dolphins for kids

Bottlenose dolphins identify themselves with a specific whistle. Each dolphin chooses its own whistle, usually by starting the day of its birthday. This name stays the same for at least ten more years.

Tooth fairy’s paradise

// May 27th, 2009 // View Comments // Dolphins for kids

Some dolphins have even more teeth than crocodiles. Bottlenose dolphins have between 88 to 100 teeth, and they only get one set of them for the rest of their lives. They don’t use their teeth to chew their food, they use them to catch their food and then they swallow it.

are sharks afraid of dolphins?

// April 23rd, 2009 // View Comments // Dolphins for kids

Not really, unless the shark is relatively smaller.
This is a common believe, based on the record of a bottlenose dolphin killing a leopard shark, that was publicized by Flipper TV show.

The truth is that dolphins will avoid natural predators whenever is possible. In the wild, dolphins and sharks pretty much leave each other alone, but 70% of wild dolphins show some degree of shark scarring.
In many cases, dolphins are able to elude attack by detecting through echolocation.

The huge gang of dolphins 2

// April 22nd, 2009 // View Comments // About Dolphins

By Melissa Bañuelos

Part II

To continue the first chapter…

Common Dolphin: They are colorful dolphins with complex patterns. Their belly is white and their back is dark gray to black from the head to the tail, forming a V on the sides. The flanks are light gray behind the dorsal fin, just like an “hourglass”. Despite its name, the common dolphin is not the popular dolphin, that place, as we have seen is for the bottlenose dolphin.



Commerson’s Dolphin: Described by Philibert Commerson, this is one of the smallest dolphin species. These dolphins are found in South America waters and the Indian Ocean. Even though they look like porpoises and have white-black patterns, they are part of the dolphin family.






Clymene Dolphin: They are similar to spinner dolphins, but smaller and more robust, with shorter beak. They have a three-shade color pattern with a dark gray cape, light gray sides, and white belly. They have a dark strip on the middle of the top of the beak.








Dusky Dolphin: they have a white grayish band on both sides that forms tow pointing blazes and a light colored face. They are found on the Southern Hemisphere, specially in South America, New Zealand, Indic Ocean and South Africa.







Fraser’s Dolphin: Fraser’s dolphin has blue-grey upper sides, and has a white or pink belly. Some of them, especially the males, have highlighted dark body stripe; the width and intensity of the stripe increases with age. They have a well-defined and short beak.


Comming soon! The Huge Gang of Dolphins 3!

Drinks for dolphins

// April 2nd, 2009 // View Comments // Dolphins for kids

Dolphins don’t drink ocean water because is too salty for them. If they decided to drink salt water, they would actually use more water trying to get rid of the salt than the water they drank first. Instead, dolphins get all the water they need from the fish they eat. Their kidneys are also adapted to retain as much water as possible. Although they live in water, they live as desert animals with no direct source of drinkable water.

The huge gang of dolphins

// March 12th, 2009 // View Comments // About Dolphins

By Melissa Bañuelos

Part I

We are used to dolphin faces in waterparks and aquariums, we watched the movie “Flipper”, we know how to draw a dolphin, we know how to identify it from sharks and other marine animals, but most of the time we are just talking about one type of dolphin called “the bottle nose dolphin”.

Contributing to the awesome variety of our Planet, there are different dolphin species: 37 types of oceanic dolphins, 4 river dolphins and 6 types of porpoises. In this article we will talk about the most common species and their main characteristics that will be useful to identify them. Next time you see a dolphin you will know which one of all the cousins is greeting you, probably it won’t be Flipper.





Atlantic Spotted Dolphin: The upper body of the Atlantic spotted dolphin is a dark gray color and they develop spots as they get older. They have a chunky beak with a white spot at the end.









Hump Backed Dolphin: They are generally gray with a lighter color along their underside. When they are young they don’t have a hump, but as they grow older the hump will appear infront of the dorsal fin. Sometimes the hump can be a third of the full body length.







Atlantic White-sided Dolphin: Black on the back, with dark grey lines and a long white oval blaze below the dorsal fin, above the blaze there is an ochre band and their belly is white. They have a black ring around the eyes.






Bottlenose dolphin: As we have mentioned, this is one of the most common species. They are truly flexible in their behavior and docile with humans. Their short beak has the shape of a bottle that appears to be floating on the water.






Part II: The Huge Ganng of Dolphins

dolphins getting a ride

// March 12th, 2009 // View Comments // Dolphins for kids

How the dolphins keep up with the boats traveling much faster? The boat creates a pressure wave as it pushes through the water. Dolphins surf on this bow wave, cleverly getting a ride at speeds they couldn’t manage on their own, more than 29 miles per hour!

Echolocation

// February 10th, 2009 // View Comments // About Dolphins

Echolocation, also called biosonar, is the biological sonar used by several animals such as dolphins, shrews, most bats and whales. It is important to marine mammals because it allows them to navigate and feed in the dark at night and in deep or murky water where it isn’t easy to see.

Toothed whales emit a focused beam of high-frequency clicks. Sounds are generated by passing air from the bony nares through the phonic lips. These sounds are reflected by the dense concave bone of the cranium and an air sac at its base. The focused beam is modulated by a large fatty organ known as the ‘melon’. This acts like an acoustic lens because it is composed of lipids of differing densities. Most toothed whales use clicks in series, or click train, for echolocation. Toothed whale whistles do not appear to be used in echolocation. Different rates of click production in a click train result on familiar barks, squeals and growls of the bottlenose dolphin.

The major areas of sound reception are the fat-filled cavities of the lower jaw bones. Sounds are received and conducted through the lower jaw to the middle ear, inner ear, and then to hearing centers in the brain via the auditory nerve. Lateral sound may be received through fatty lobes surrounding the ears with a similar acoustic density to the bone. The brain receives the sound waves in the form of nerve impulses, which relay the messages of sound and enable the dolphin to interpret the sound’s meaning.

Bottlenose dolphins are able to learn and later recognize the echo signatures returned by preferred prey species.