A massive group of dolphins was recently spotted off California’s Central Coast, participating in what researchers say was likely a “big social gathering” that amassed a crowd of the aquatic mammals over 1,500 strong.
Evan Brodsky, a captain with Monterey Bay Whale Watch, and marine biologist Colleen Talty were taking turns driving a 20-foot inflatable boat on Carmel Bay near Point Lobos last Friday, conducting research on grey whales. At one point, a nearby vessel alerted them to a group of hundreds of Risso’s dolphins.
“We got there and realized there were a lot more than a few hundreds,” Brodsky told SFGATE.
Brodsky took aerial footage of the animals with a drone camera, which he and Talty used to estimate the group’s size by taking the number of fins seen above the water and multiplying that by three to account for the number of dolphins below the surface.
“We were amazed at what we saw,” Brodsky said. “There were thousands of dolphins, about 1,500 or more, just little white dots everywhere on my screen.”
Though a group of dolphins that size is occasionally seen along California’s coast, Brodsky and Talty agreed this was a rare sighting for this particular species.
“They were jumping out of the water, breaching, spy hopping, sticking their heads out of the water,” Talty told SFGATE. “They also swam right up to the boat, which is not very typical for this species of dolphin. So that was pretty amazing.”
The pod of dolphins was made up of several smaller groups who likely “came together for a big social gathering,” Talty said. Some dolphins were seen mating, while others were simply socializing as the group slowly made their way south.
“I don’t think they were feeding or anything. They were just having a lot of fun all together,” Talty said.
Brodsky said he hopes his video footage might encourage people to view aquatic animals like dolphins in their natural habitat, instead of paying to seem them at theme parks like Sea World.
“It’s important to me, because unfortunately, these dolphins are still hunted in some parts of the world, and still collected for the really abusive captive industry,” Brodsky said. “So it’s really special to see them wild and free and promote to see them wild and free, because that’s the only way these dolphin performances are going to stop.”
