Manatees and Dolphins

November is Manatee Awareness Month! So, in honor of this gentle sea cow, we decided to do a post highlighting a few of the similarities and differences between manatees and dolphins!     First, the similarities Both are marine mammals, which means they are mammals that rely on the ocean

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Lost Lamda

Lost Lamda: A Stranded Dolphin in the Bahamas LAMDA’S HISTORY We first observed Lamda in 2013 as a juvenile in the speckled age class (approximately 4-8 years old) and frequently saw him every field season since then for a total of 20 times.  In 2015, he moved to the mottled

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Florida Work Day 9-19-2018

The Bahamas summer field season has come to an end, but that doesn’t mean our days on the water are over. We also conduct surveys along part of our Florida coast under an NMFS permit. On Wednesday last week we took advantage of the calm, glassy waters and went searching

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2018 Field Season: Trip 9

Trip 9 By: Cassie Volker, Research Assistant I can’t believe I am writing the last blog entry for the 2018 field season, man it flew by! But we couldn’t have had a better way to end the season. Trip 9 started out with a few quick encounters with some Bimini

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2018 Field Season: Trip 8 & E.A.R. update

TRIP 8 – E.A.R. work and finding our missing dolphins! By Dr. Denise Herzing Well, after reviewing two months of E.A.R. (Ecological Acoustic Recorder) data we began seeing a clear pattern for one of our locations.  Using this knowledge, we set out on Trip 8 to find some of the

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2018 Field Season: Trip 7

By Liah McPherson   Trip 7 of our field season began with a great encounter with moms and calves on our first day! We had just cleared customs and were heading to anchorage when spotted dolphins came leaping to the bow of the RV Stenella. The group consisted of Naia,

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Dolphins and Drones— Studying Behavior from Above

As any scientist will tell you, field work is no walk in the park.  In our case, the research depends on calm enough weather, a smoothly running boat, and the agenda of wild dolphins.  The ocean could be as flat as glass— but if the dolphins aren’t interested in our

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2018 Field Season: Trip 6

By Cassie Volker   Unfortunately, the weather got the best of us this trip. We had mostly sunny skies during the days, but the wind was whipping like crazy! When we have high winds the water becomes too rough for us to work and we end up anchoring for cover.

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2018 Field Season: Trip 5

  By Liah McPherson   We began Trip 5 of our field season on the Little Bahama Bank, off Grand Bahama Island, retrieving the acoustic receivers that were deployed on Trip 3 and looking for the elusive spotted dolphins in that region.  (To learn more about these receivers check out

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Trip 4: Smooth Seas and Lots of Dolphins

Writing and Photos By Bethany Augliere   I’ll just start by saying that Trip 4 was fantastic! We had spectacular weather, amazing dolphin encounters, and a great group of people.   Grand Bahama Island On our crossing over to Grand Bahama Island, some of the crew onboard saw false killer

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