Diagnostic ultrasound examination of a dolphin being performed off the stern of the veterinary examination vessel R/V Flip while blood samples are being processed on the R/V Challenger, rafted alongside.

One of the primary objectives of this project was to collect samples and diagnostic measurements from Sarasota Bay dolphins for comparison to the same health parameters for dolphins in bays exposed to oil from the April 2010 Deep Water Horizon spill in the northern Gulf of Mexico, as part of the Natural Resource Damage Assessment. Because Deep Water Horizon oil did not reach Sarasota, and extensive background data are available for the locally resident dolphins, Sarasota Bay dolphins serve as a reference population.

A related study in 2011 showed significant health differences between dolphins in Sarasota Bay and those in Barataria Bay, Louisiana, which faced heavy oiling from the spill. The current research is a follow-up to the 2011 study.

For more information, please visit:

http://www.nmfs.noaa.gov/stories/2011/08/22_dolphin_health_assessment.html

http://www.gulfspillrestoration.noaa.gov/2012/03/study-shows-some-gulf-dolphins-severely-ill/

In fact, in middle school I planned on a pre-med and theater double-major in college, which I suppose would have meant practicing medicine during the week and community theater on the weekends.

Thankfully for theater audiences across Virginia and elsewhere, my career pursuits took a dramatic turn when I took a marine mammals course at the Duke Marine Laboratory during the summer between my Junior and Senior years at the College of William and Mary.  I loved everything about the course and wanted to learn more.

Several of the instructors (Andy Read, Kim Urian, Doug Nowacek, Damon Gannon, Danielle Waples) hailed from the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program and strongly encouraged me to pursue an internship if I was ‘truly serious about wanting to work with marine mammals.’  So, I applied for the internship with Randy and made my way down to Sarasota the day after college graduation.  My friends, many of whom were business majors and moving to large cities were confused by my post-graduate career choice as they were being offered signing bonuses and on their way to becoming a departmental VP, while I was heading to a smaller town in Florida to spend the summer ‘volunteering on a boat.’

That opportunity to ‘volunteer on a boat’ for the SDRP during the summer of 2000 turned out to be the best decision of my career.  I say this because the SDRP internship was, without a doubt, a springboard that propelled me towards future graduate and professional opportunities.

My internship during the summer of 2000 focused primarily on the graduate work of Caryn Owen, who was examining maternal investment strategies of adult female dolphins and their new babies (YOYs).  The brand new and shiny R/V Nai’a was our home away from home that summer and the platform for two other acoustic projects for which Dr. Katie McHugh was also an intern.

That summer we all experienced the rigors of field work (i.e., long days in the hot Florida sun), but also the satisfaction of contributing to research that was aiming to understand reasons for poor survival of first-born calves and anthropogenic threats to Sarasota Bay dolphins.  In the summer of 2000, I learned how to drive a boat, participated in my first health assessment, enhanced my dolphin-spotting abilities, learned how to conduct focal animal behavioral follows, and developed lab skills for post-field data processing.  Unbeknownst to me at the time, the skills that I developed during my SDRP internship became critical to my graduate school pursuits, and eventually integrated into my normal career routine today.

After leaving Mote and the SDRP internship, I travelled around North and South Carolina and the east coast of Florida targeting short-term environmental jobs and another marine mammal summer internship until I started a Master’s program (in Environmental Studies) at the College of Charleston (SC).  My thesis research used stranding data to quantify the level of interaction between bottlenose dolphins and the blue crab fishery in South Carolina under the advisement of Wayne McFee and in collaboration with Eric Zolman and Todd Speakman (two more people closely affiliated with SDRP).  Although the SDRP internship was not directly related to my Master’s research, Randy’s conservation message that underlies all of the research conducted by SDRP was a prominent theme throughout my thesis.  Following the completion of my Master’s education, I was hired as a contractor for NOAA to assist with marine mammal necropsies and stranding response, a 4.5-year opportunity that strengthened my understanding of marine mammal biology and physiology and piqued my interests in bottlenose dolphin health and disease.

In August of 2007, I left my strandings position with NOAA to pursue a Ph.D. in epidemiology at the Medical University of South Carolina (Charleston).  Since leaving Sarasota in 2000, I maintained contact with a few interns and staff, and met new staff members over the years during NOAA-related research projects, but the real reunion with the SDRP lab and Randy occurred when I began my Ph.D.  Thankfully, Randy agreed to serve a major role on my committee (along with my primary advisor, Dr. Lori Schwacke – another person affiliated with SDRP!) and contribute over 2/3 of the data to my project that examined the prevalence, persistence, and factors contributing to skin lesions and skin disease (particularly lacaziosis) in wild bottlenose dolphins.

I spent the next four years searching for lesions in thousands of photographs of Sarasota Bay dolphins, participating in Sarasota Bay dolphin health assessments to collect skin lesion samples, and modeling environmental and biological factors associated with skin lesion occurrence.  Once again, the skills necessary for my long-term career as a wildlife epidemiologist were rooted in Sarasota.

I am now working as a contractor again for NOAA in Dr. Schwacke’s Sentinel Species Program at the Hollings Marine Laboratory in Charleston, SC.  Our program uses studies of bottlenose dolphin health to identify ecosystem and human health risks in southeastern coastal estuaries.  Our research group routinely collaborates with the SDRP for remote biopsy and capture-release health assessment projects, as well as studies that take advantage of Randy’s long-term data set to define quantitative measures of health.  Twenty-five years ago I would have never imagined myself as a marine mammal scientist, especially an epidemiologist.  Twelve years ago, I wouldn’t have guessed that I would still be driving a boat during field projects, participating in dolphin health assessments, or using any of the other skills I learned during the summer of 2000.  I love what I do and consider myself extremely fortunate for the many opportunities that I have had over the past 12 years, many of which I am certain are attributable to my experience as a SDRP intern.

—–

This article was published on page 42 in the January 2013 Nicks n Notches.

Do you value and support conservation organizations?  If so, please consider supporting the SDRP.  Become a member or donate to the SDRP.  Your contribution will help make the work possible.

The River is very important for China, and it is called the River of Mother by the local people, not only because it nourishes hundreds of millions of Chinese people, but also because of its rich biodiversity.

Moreover, the Yangtze River is also unique because it is one of the only two river systems in the world with two endemic cetacean species living in it, the Yangtze River Dolphin or baiji, and the only freshwater subspecies of finless porpoise, or Yangtze finless porpoise.

However, due to the population explosion and economic boom in this region, the natural habitats and resources have been drastically exploited in the past several decades. The biodiversity of the Yangtze ecosystem has been devastatingly destroyed. The Institute of Hydrobiology (IHB), Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) is one of the distinguished research units for conservation of the hydro-biological diversity of the freshwater system in China, located in Wuhan, the biggest city in central China along the middle reaches of the Yangtze River.

I became a PhD candidate of IHB in 2003, and met Dr. Randall Wells for the first time in 2004 when he was invited by Dr. Wang Ding to

participating in Sarasota bay dolphin surveys with former intern Mridula Srinivasan and SDRP research assistant Aaron Barleycorn.

attend a workshop at IHB on rescue of the Yangtze River dolphins. He generously shared his expertise on research and conservation of the dolphins during the workshop. I was assigned as a coordinator of this workshop and got a chance to talk with Dr. Wells and to get a glimpse of his research program.

As one of the outputs of the workshop, one of our research staff was generously invited by Dr. Wells to learn dolphin capture and soft-release skills with the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program (SDRP) in 2005. He presented a brief report on the SDRP and his two-week training in Sarasota Bay after he came back to China, which gave me a vivid view of the beautiful city and distinguished research institution. Since then, I decided to look for chance to visit the beautiful city and join the outstanding research program someday.

In 2006, I got my PhD and began to work in IHB as a permanent staff member. In 2011, I got a funding opportunity from CAS to support me to study in the U.S. At the end of November 2011, I attended the 19th Biennial Conference on the Biology of Marine Mammals, in Tampa, and was given a chance to present our work by speed presentation right after the opening ceremony. After the presentation, Dr. Wells walked to my table, asked me about the exchange situation with the interested researchers and gave me some warm encouraging words on my presentation. I took the chance to talk about my plan to visit Sarasota. He kindly accepted my application, and finally made my dream come true in 2012!

In 2006, suggested by the 2004 workshop, a whole range survey was conducted to search for any baiji possibly still living in the Yangtze River. Frustratingly, however, no baiji was sighted during the 48-day expedition. The baiji was announced to be functionally extinct in 2007. It was the first cetacean species to go extinct because of human influences, and this event was listed as the top 10 man-made disasters by the New York Times in 2007. The Yangtze finless porpoise is now likely the only cetacean species still living in the Yangtze River. Due to the similar threats faced by the baiji, the population of the porpoise has also declined drastically in the past several decades, and the present population is only about 1,000. The Chinese people and government can no longer tolerate the loss of the only cetacean in the Yangtze. How to identify their key habitats and their major threats, how to quantify and relieve the various human impacts on this endangered species amid the booming economy? These are the main urgent questions needed to be answered by Chinese researchers, and these are also my objectives to visit and study in Sarasota Bay.

I arrived in Sarasota on 25 September. Dr. Wells gave me a brief introduction to Mote Marine Laboratory and guided me on an introductory visit to the dolphin hospital, Stranding Investigations Program and manatee care and training program, etc. I participated in the monthly photo-ID and human interaction surveys that have long been conducted by the dolphin program. I was astonished when I participated in the field surveys that the staff members, including Dr. Katie McHugh, Aaron Barleycorn, Jason Allen, Dr. Brian Balmer and Sunnie Hart, can recognize nearly all of the more than 160 animals in the Bay just by a quick glimpse of their dorsal fins. It is really amazing! I’m sure one couldn’t get this ability without long time and studious practice. During the field trips, I also learned from Aaron to recognize lots of animals particularly birds in this region. I do really admire that he can recognize almost all of the animals and plants in this region. He is truly a nature lover and a real biologist!  Most importantly, I think, I got the chance to learn the

system guided by Dr. McHugh. It is powerful software for cetacean field research and management, and it will be very helpful for my research on finless porpoise. Taking this opportunity, I also got chance to talk with some researchers, trainers, and interns in other Mote programs, which vastly broaden and improve my perspective on marine mammal research.

I think I’m lucky to have this opportunity to work with a group of such lovely, enthusiastic and dedicated people in such a beautiful place. Particularly I want to express my sincerest thanks to Dr. Wells for giving me this opportunity to work with his group and making my long time dream become true. I’m confident that what I learned and felt in Sarasota Bay will help me in my future career. More importantly, this visit also made a new dream for me, which is to make my city and my country to become a harmonious and beautiful home of human and wildness!

—–

This article was published on page 38 in the January 2013 Nicks n Notches.

Do you value and support conservation organizations?  If so, please consider supporting the SDRP.  Become a member or donate to the SDRP.

Your contribution will help make the work possible.

We are called The MareCet Research Organization, and we have concurrent affiliations with the Institute of Ocean and Earth Sciences, University Malaya and Environmental Resources Management, an international environmental consultancy.

In March 2012, we were offered the opportunity of a lifetime by Dr. Jay Sweeney, one of SDRP’s lead vets, with an official invitation from Dr. Randy Wells, to join the Sarasota Dolphin Health Assessment Project that was going to take place in May 2012.

The SDRP is well-known globally, and we had seen the name “Randall Wells” on many scientific publications, so it was rather surreal that we would be making the trip halfway across the world from Malaysia to partake in the world’s longest running study of a dolphin population and meet the man himself.

For five days, we assisted the SDRP team in the field and were able to participate in most aspects of the fieldwork, which included releasing the net from the boat, holding the dolphins in the water, assisting in the animals’ subsequent releases and helped the acoustic tracking team record data on R/V Nai‘a. We also got to witness first-hand the various ways in which morphometric and physiological measurements were taken, how biological samples were collected, the methods of trying to develop a better suction-cup tag for dolphins, and most exciting of all, to observe how ultrasound is conducted on dolphins and to see its outputs on the computer screen.

Malaysian team participating in 2012 Sarasota Bay health assessments.

Participating in this project has sparked many new ideas for our future research work in Malaysia, especially in our core project area in the Langkawi Archipelago. We were especially inspired by all the dedicated vets working so professionally in tandem with each other onboard R/V Flip. Observing such skill and professionalism in marine mammal veterinary care has reinforced our hopes and dreams of providing training in this field, through our organization and with the tutelage of Dr. Sweeney, to keen and dedicated vets in Malaysia. Although there are many qualified vets in Malaysia, none have ever been trained in marine mammal husbandry, resulting in a lack of know-how when it comes to dealing with stranded animals, dead or alive.

We already have a catalog of dorsal fins of 120 Indo-Pacific humpback dolphins from Langkawi, which we started in November 2010, and would like to improve the ways in which we manage our database by following some of the examples set by the SDRP team. Someday, hopefully not too long from now, perhaps we will be able to emulate the health assessments efforts of the SDRP team by doing the same with our dolphins and Indo-Pacific finless porpoises in Langkawi. Although not exactly dolphin-related, we were also motivated by the Intracoastal Waterway channel (ICW) and speed zone systems in Sarasota Bay, and hope to suggest similar vessel traffic guidelines to the authorities in Langkawi in areas where we will ascertain to be critical habitats for cetaceans.

After eight days of being in Sarasota, we were enriched with new knowledge on dolphin research, made wonderful new friends and gained what we’d like to call new MareCet partners (i.e., all of you at SDRP). Our warmest heartfelt Malaysian greetings and thank you goes out to Randy, Blair and Michael for having accommodated our participation in the most generous and kind manner. Last but not least, to the wonderful and multi-talented Jay Sweeney, an infinite thank you for taking us under your wings (or should we say fins!). We hope to welcome all of you at SDRP to our shores someday.

—–

This article was published on page 37 in the January 2013 Nicks n Notches.

Do you value and support conservation organizations?  If so, please consider supporting the SDRP.  Become a member or donate to the SDRP.

Your contribution will help make the work possible.

When he described his proposed dissertation research with bottlenose dolphins in Sarasota Bay to me, my first reaction was: “You’re crazy!”

An unmanned blimp, remote-controlled video cameras, hydrophones, and a couple of boats…“ambitious” didn’t begin to describe the project.  “Hopelessly complex and unwieldy” was more like it.

I don’t think I was the only one who was skeptical.  But of course, I never mentioned this to Doug.  He was so excited about his project; I didn’t want to burst his bubble (or his blimp!).  I figured he’d learn how hopeless it was soon enough.

I first met Doug Nowacek in the spring of 1995.  I was finishing my master’s degree and he was just starting his Ph.D.

Clearly I had underestimated Doug’s technical skills and his sheer tenacity.  So it was more than a little ironic when I started to collaborate with him five years later on a project using the blimp system to perform acoustic playback experiments on wild bottlenose dolphins.

The goal of the project was to find out whether bottlenose dolphins use passive listening to locate noise-making prey, and how they trade off between using passive listening and echolocation.  This work resulted in a paper published in 2005 in Animal Behaviour and in many amusing “Blimp Stories.”  Here is a good Blimp Story from that playback project…

One of the biggest challenges of field work in Florida is dealing with frequent thunderstorms.  Squalls are bad enough when you just have a boat to worry about.  But things get really dicey when your boat has a 200-foot tether attached to a 30-foot-long blimp.  It’s like an extreme version of Ben Franklin’s kite experiment, except that it takes place at sea.

On one particular afternoon during September of 2000, we had been conducting sound playback trials with dolphins in Palma Sola Bay.  The work was going well; by mid-afternoon we had several successful trials under our belt.  But our luck soon ran out.  A thunderhead sprouted up right over us.  Caught in a down-draft, the blimp suddenly took a nose dive toward the water.  Doug’s instruction manual hadn’t prepared us for this!  As the rest of us froze in horror, Doug leapt up to Hobo’s foredeck and started hauling in on the blimp’s tether to get it lined up over its cradle before it crashed into the water.  As we were madly retrieving the blimp, a funnel cloud began form, like a finger pointing down from the sky.  Thanks to Doug’s decisive action, we managed to get the blimp secured in its cradle in time to avert disaster.  Fortunately, by the time we got everything tied down, the storm had already moved off.

As I was catching my breath, I thought to myself that we’d had enough excitement for one day and that we should probably head back to the dock before the next squall hit us.  But as I remember it, Doug’s reaction was: “I think we have time for another playback before the next storm comes.”  It turned out that he was right…again.

The Blimp played an important role in a number of research projects, including studies of dolphin foraging patterns, behavior, and acoustics, dolphin and manatee responses to boat approaches, dolphin behavior around fishing nets, manatee life history, and human interactions with manatees.  In summer 2012, former Blimp fliers Randy Wells, Doug Nowacek, and Damon Gannon agreed that the Blimp would likely never fly again, and, sadly and respectfully, it was decommissioned…

—–

This article was published on page 48 in the January 2013 Nicks n Notches.

Do you value and support conservation organizations?  If so, please consider supporting the SDRP.  Become a member or donate to the SDRP.

Your contribution will help make the work possible.

At first I was disappointed.

I had been anticipating that I would be working closely with dolphins, but as it turned out my summer would be filled with long hard days of fishing with a large mesh net, called a purse seine. Boy was I in for a surprise.

I never could have anticipated how exhilarating it would be to sample fish in Sarasota Bay.

I spent, by far, one of the best summers of my life learning about boating, seining, and fish. I can still remember bringing up our first net and grabbing hold of my first pinfish, trying not to get pricked by spines while trying to get a good length measurement.

Dr. Damon Gannon was the lead scientists on this project, and he was truly an inspiring mentor. He, along with Elizabeth Berens and Sandy Camilleri, taught me the skills to sample, measure, identify species, and collect/organize data. He also shared priceless advice on applying and succeeding in graduate school. I am truly thankful for the skills, which I now use on a daily basis that I learned while an intern at SDRP. My summer in Sarasota introduced me not only to some amazing people I will never forget, but also to the boundless world of fish biology.

After that summer, I started orienting my course work towards fish biology, taking ichthyology, fish ecology, etc., eventually deciding I wanted to get a Master’s degree. I applied to Towson University to work with Dr. Jay Nelson, in his fish physiology lab in the fall of 2010. I somehow managed to talk him into working on an estuarine species he had never worked with in his lab before, the striped bass, more commonly known as rockfish.

We designed my project to explore what factors contribute to the hypoxia tolerance in this species. Hypoxia (2 mg O2 L-1) occurs annually in the Chesapeake Bay, which is an important spawning and nursery habitat for this species. Therefore, it is important for managers to understand how this commercially and recreationally important species responds and copes with low oxygen concentrations.

Like many budding scientists, I had heard that experimentation is not an easy road, but experiencing it yourself is another story. I had a few bumps along the way, but came out on the other side with some novel and exciting results. I am currently finishing up writing the final chapter of my thesis, writing manuscripts for publication (including a letter published in Science magazine in July 2012!), and preparing to defend in the next couple months.

In my spare time, I am applying to jobs that will allow me to continue researching and learning about the incredible things fish are capable of. I found my passion for research while with SDRP, I have honed those skills as a master’s student, and I hope to continue in research in the future. Someone once told me that “effective management is predicated on sound science.” I hope my research will contribute to our knowledge of how these creatures utilize the environment, to help us better manage human impact.

I am very thankful that I got to spend a summer fishing with SDRP. I am proud to say that I belong to the SDRP family, and I hope that one day I will find myself again on R/V Flip, heading out into Sarasota Bay to seine, watching the resident dolphins jump in our wake.

—–

This article was published on page 41 in the January 2013 Nicks n Notches.

Do you value and support conservation organizations?  If so, please consider supporting the SDRP.  Become a member or donate to the SDRP.

Your contribution will help make the work possible.

I had just graduated from college, and was working with the SDRP and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) on a project exploring the acoustics and behavior of female dolphins and their calves.  I enjoyed being out on the water, and learning to work in a science team.

That summer got me revved up for my upcoming graduate work – first as a Master’s student at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland studying grey seal vocalizations and then as a Ph.D. student at MIT and WHOI working on the social and vocal behavior of Norwegian killer whales.

As the end of my Ph.D. loomed, I thought back over my time in graduate school.  I had enjoyed doing the fieldwork and research, but my favorite moments from those years had involved teaching and telling others about my science. So I decided to switch fields to science communication, and enter the world of public radio and audio storytelling.

I began working with Atlantic Public Media (APM), a creative audio storytelling collective in Woods Hole.  Their offices are situated next door to the location where I’d had regular meetings with one of my committee members for several years.  I’d never noticed APM before.  It was as though they grew out of the Earth right when I needed them.

My early stories for APM were short 60 or 90-second science spots called “science minutes” that aired on WCAI, the Cape and Islands NPR station.  It was my first opportunity to interview scientists with a digital recorder and microphone, and then edit the audio into a story.  I fell in love with it.  I was using the same software I’d used to listen to the killer whale calls.  But now, I understood what my subjects were saying.

For the last 4 years, I’ve been freelancing as an independent reporter and producer, contributing radio stories to national programs including The World, Radiolab, Morning Edition, All Things Considered, and Studio 360, and multimedia pieces to science departments, research organizations, and non-profits.  I love my work – it’s the perfect blend of learning new things about science, meeting new people, travel, combining my creative and analytical sides, and being independent.

I’ve even reported a couple of radio stories on cetaceans, and one featuring Mote Marine Lab scientist Barb Kirkpatrick.  You can follow my work on my website: www.aridanielshapiro.com.

—–

This article was published on page 40 in the January 2013 Nicks n Notches.

Do you value and support conservation organizations?  If so, please consider supporting the SDRP.  Become a member or donate to the SDRP.

Your contribution will help make the work possible.

Our international headquarters is based on Cape Cod – one of the rare hot spots in the world where mass strandings of dolphins and whales occur on a regular basis.

IFAW’s Marine Mammal Rescue and Research (MMRR) team responds to an average of 240 stranded marine mammals here each year. What makes our work truly exciting is that 47% of the cetaceans we find are alive, giving us the opportunity to learn a great deal about the health of the populations.

Learning from our colleagues is one of the best ways to constantly improve our stranding response techniques.

Our goal is to return as many healthy animals as possible back to the wild immediately. We focus on providing excellent supportive care, conducting in-depth health assessments and collecting as much data as possible from each animal.

Working with the SDRP was a logical step in our efforts to constantly improve our response and assessment protocols.  The long-standing health assessment program in Sarasota is a great model for combining animal welfare and science. By working with the SDRP team, we hope to learn ways to streamline our health evaluations, while also increasing the amount of data we gather.

In the winter of 2012, IFAW’s MMRR team experienced the largest stranding in recorded history for our region, in which 216 common dolphins stranded over 80 days. With hard work, determination and sound science, we were able to successfully release 73 of the 98 dolphins that stranded alive!

That’s a 74% success rate which demonstrates a huge step forward when compared to the 14% success rate of just over a decade ago.  Improved supportive care, development of new response equipment, and refinement of techniques have resulted in faster and more effective responses which were the keys to this improvement.

An equally important aspect of the work has been the use of satellite-linked tags to monitor animals after release. Tracking the animals allows us to determine survivability, behavior, and habitat usage. During this busy season, we deployed 19 satellite-linked tags, using every tag we had in stock.

SDRP came to our assistance by providing us with four additional tags to help us track more dolphins. This project not only yields new information about dolphin habitat, but it also helps us measure the success of our health assessment techniques.  It is the ultimate union of good animal welfare and good science.

—–

This article was published on page 40 in the January 2013 Nicks n Notches.

Do you value and support conservation organizations?  If so, please consider supporting the SDRP.  Become a member or donate to the SDRP.

Your contribution will help make the work possible.

Sarasota Bay is a natural laboratory where the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program has worked for more than 40 years with a population of bottlenose dolphins.

It is a world reference for research on cetaceans. Therefore, training with the team of researchers from the SDRP was a great opportunity to improve my knowledge.

The first time that I came to Sarasota, in 2011, was to participate in the Dolphin Health Assessment Project. It was an unforgettable experience! Then I came back in 2012, and this time, I had the opportunity to understand all that is behind the capture and release of wild dolphins.

I participated in synoptic surveys, focal animal behavioral follows, photo-identification, helped in the fish survey boat, learned to do radio-tracking and could see what the dolphins do under the water! I also had my first experience going offshore on the Gulf of Mexico.

I came back to Brazil two months later, full of new ideas and perspectives of how I can study more and better the population of dolphins that I work on!

I want to thank Randy for the enriching experience, and all the SDRP friends, for the attention and for teaching me during the time I spent with you!

—–

This article was published on page 39 in the January 2013 Nicks n Notches.

Do you value and support conservation organizations?  If so, please consider supporting the SDRP.  Become a member or donate to the SDRP.

Your contribution will help make the work possible.

In this area, Guiana dolphins (Sotalia guianensis) and Toninha (Franciscana dolphins) are the most frequent dolphins inside the bay and in the shallow waters.

Both are considered “threatened species.”

The LEC team takes an ecological and ethnoecological approach to studying dolphins. We use a variety of methods to analyze population structures and dynamics, habitat use, social behaviors, foraging behaviors, diet, and health conditions. We also evaluate human interactions and their impact on the dolphins. Through the collaboration of the LEC and different institutions such as ICMBIO, IBAMA, UERJ, UEL, UNIVILLE, FURG, FIOCRUZ (GEMM-LAGOS), GEMARS and UERGS, over 20 academic studies have been conducted using samples from Parana dolphins. I have recently had the wonderful opportunity to train with the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program (SDRP) and learn from the experience of Dr. Randall Wells and his staff. The training I have received in Sarasota will translate well to our work at the LEC, thereby improving our knowledge and skills.

I was glad to be part of this team during spring 2012. I was in Sarasota for six weeks and I participated in focal dolphin behavioral follows, dolphin photographic identification surveys, and the health assessment program. I accompanied the SDRP team to collect behavior and bioacoustics data, to track tagged animals, and to capture and release dolphins.  I also learned about handling techniques and sample collection. Additionally,  I learned more about photo-identification techniques,  how to organize and integrate data to make the analyses easier,  new methods to analyze social behavior data and I have had the opportunity to meet some incredible people that study and are really involved with the conservation of these animals. The time here has been a lesson of involvement, respect, dedication and hard work for conservation of marine mammals. I hope I can transmit the knowledge that I acquired to the LEC team and make our work better…I hope to come back next year!

—–

This article was published on page 39 in the January 2013 Nicks n Notches.

Do you value and support conservation organizations?  If so, please consider supporting the SDRP.  Become a member or donate to the SDRP.

Your contribution will help make the work possible.