New Sarasota Bay Dolphin Calf

During our September dolphin surveys, we observed the sixth new calf in the Sarasota Bay dolphin community of 2023 (unfortunately, three of these are no longer seen). Mom, Claire (F131) is 35 years old and a well-known member of the community. Claire has been observed more than 1,280 times and in 2019, she survived a large shark bite. She’s named after the wife of Dr. Perry Gilbert, the Director of Mote Marine Laboratory at the time the SDRP was founded in 1970. Claire is part of a documented six-generation matrilineage of Sarasota Bay dolphins that includes “Granny” — the first documented grandmother in the community — who in 1974 gave birth to Claire’s mom “Genie,” nicknamed in honor of Mote Marine Laboratory founding director Dr. Eugenie Clark. This is Claire’s 10^th calf!

Notable Sighting of a Venerable Dolphin

In September, we also observed FB54. At 52, she’s currently the oldest-living member of the Sarasota Bay dolphin community and the last remaining dolphin we met during our research back in the mid-1970s.

• Learn more about her here

Notes from the Field and Lab

As summer turns to fall, I’d like to say things were slowing down a bit after a busy field work season. But heading into the home-stretch of 2023, I think we’re as busy as ever! Here are some of our most recent highlights:

Offshore Dolphin Health Assessments and Tagging

We spent the summer tracking offshore bottlenose dolphins John and Per and Atlantic spotted dolphins Teri, Michael and Hannah. If you recall, John, Per, Teri and Michael were tagged in May and Hannah was tagged in August using our new TADpole tagging tool.

Their tags have now stopped transmitting. As was the case with the offshore dolphins we tagged in 2022, most remained off the coast of Southwest Florida, often in the same general area in which they were tagged.

In September, we headed offshore again for what was to be the final offshore health assessment funded through a grant from the Florida RESTORE Act Centers of Excellence Program. On Sept. 18, we tagged “Jay,” a nearly 9-foot male bottlenose dolphin 23 miles off Sarasota in 80 feet of water. Since he’s been tagged, Jay has ranged mostly offshore of Venice/Englewood but has traveled as far south as Charlotte Harbor. The map shows all of the high-quality locations from satellite-linked tracking since Jay’s tagging.

Because of high winds, Jay (pictured below) was the only dolphin we tagged that session. We hope to conduct our final offshore session at the end of this month.

Seasonal Prey Fish Surveys

In September, we completed our summer prey fish surveys. Preliminary analyses of 2023 data indicate above-average fish and dolphin-prey-fish abundances, with 2023 ranking eighth highest in abundance of the 20 summer seasons we’ve been conducting these surveys since they began in 2004. Fish surveys are led by Senior Researcher Elizabeth Berens McCabe and will continue in January. (If you’d like to learn more, check out our Facebook posts from September, when we ran a series about dolphin prey.)

Sarasota Bay Listening Network (SBLN)

SBLN manager Dr. Katy Holmes is pleased to announce that all 12 of our shore-based underwater listening stations are now up and running, recording sounds from fish, dolphins, manatees, invertebrates and boats. The stations are spread between Anna Maria Island and Historic Spanish Point (near Osprey). Hurricane damage and maintenance issues have now been repaired, and the stations are recording huge volumes of acoustic data, monitoring the underwater soundscape.

Shark Surveys

Dr. Krystan Wilkinson joined Mote Marine Laboratory staff for their large-shark surveys in September, collecting blood and fecal samples to support her research on shark-dolphin diet overlap. The team also deployed nine acoustic tags on bull sharks — the primary predator of Sarasota Bay dolphins — to better understand their habitat use and movements in relation to our local dolphins. The tags should last up to nine years and movements will be recorded by the Sarasota Coast Acoustic Network (SCAN), an array of underwater receivers. Krystan and Research Associate Kim Bassos Hull manage SCAN through the SDRP.

Ray Tagging

Kim, Krystan and Staff Researcher Jonathan Crossman also worked with Florida Atlantic University’s Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute (FAU-HBOI), the University of North Carolina and Universidad De San Francisco Quito to tag eight spotted eagle ray pups with acoustic transmitters to better understand Sarasota Bay as a nursery area for these endangered rays. Around-the-clock tracking by Krystan, Kim and Elizabeth documented limited movements during the first few days.

Follow-Up Monitoring

We continue to monitor dolphin calf 2094, which we disentangled in February. The calf has since regained the use of her tail flukes, her shark bite wound that we first documented in April also appears to have healed well, and she seems to be doing fine.

The SDRP conducts follow-up monitoring for rescued dolphins from many places thanks to support from the John H. Prescott Marine Mammal Rescue Assistance Grant Program.

Through mid-September, we continued to track a mother who, along with her calf, was rescued from a tidal pond system near Grand Isle, Louisiana.

The pair are a part of the Barataria Bay dolphin community, where we work with NOAA and other organizations to conduct periodic health assessments and other research because of the ongoing issues related to the Deepwater Horizon oil disaster. The dolphins, first spotted in the pond in 2022, were believed to have been left there following Hurricane Ida in 2021. Because the calf was so young, the National Marine Fisheries Service (which oversees the protection of wild dolphins in the U.S.) determined that any rescue would have to wait until it was older. The Audubon Nature Institute’s Coastal Wildlife Network monitored the dolphin monthly until officials determined the animal was suitable for rescue. Audubon, the National Marine Mammal Foundation and other partners in the Louisiana Marine Mammal Stranding Network moved the animals to open water in June. At the time, mom — nicknamed Moira — was outfitted with one of our satellite-linked transmitters to allow us to follow her. Transmissions over three months showed her spending most of her time just to the west of Barataria Bay.

In the Lab

It was a busy month in the lab as well, with staff preparing nine research proposals, and performing data analyses, writing reports and performing equipment maintenance — some of the essential work that allows us to bring you findings like those described here.

That’s all for this month, but here’s to fair winds and cooling seas!

Randy Wells

Fin of the Month

Name: F295 (formerly C79A)

Age: 2

Sex: Female

A Dolphin’s Life: We’ve observed F295 more than 50 times since our first sighting of her as a newborn on April 7, 2021. She was the 11^th calf of Vespa

(dolphin FB79), who was 42 when F295 was born.

Vespa died in late August 2022 when F295 was only 17 months old. While orphaned dolphins are not common in the Sarasota Bay community, several have been noted over the past 52 years of the CZS-SDRP. Typically, we don’t see orphaned calves adopted or otherwise assisted by other members of the community and, if they survive, their activity and behavior resembles that of other young individuals when they first leave their mothers.

In May, F295 was one of the dolphins we did a medical check-up on during our health assessments. She has now survived more than a year on her own and appears to be doing very well. During the assessment we captured a recording of her vocalizations.

• Visit her webpage to hear what she sounds like!

In September, one of our Facebook followers, Jared Kaufman, sent us this video of F295 swimming along his seawall. She’s apparently a frequent visitor to his backyard. Using seawalls to help capture prey fish is a fairly common behavior for Sarasota dolphins and it’s good to see F295 engaging in normal feeding patterns. Her mom was known for unnatural feeding behaviors, such as interacting with anglers by stalking boats, bridges and piers and waiting for discarded bait and catch. We know that Vespa passed these behaviors to several of her calves and grandcalves, which has led to their entanglement in fishing line, hooking, ingestion of gear and other sad consequences.

• Visit our website to learn more about dolphin-safe fishing and keeping wild dolphins wild!

Special note about the video: Jared was able to get so close to F295 because he was taking this video from land. If you’re in your boat or on a jet ski and see dolphins in the wild, please be sure to follow the federal Marine Mammal Protection Act rules and view them from at least 50 yards away — that’s half a football field long.

For more information on how you can help support wild dolphin research, please email Randy Wells, Director of the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program, or call 941.374.0449.

Dolphin Biology Research Institute — DBA Sarasota Dolphin Research Program — is dedicated to research and conservation of dolphins and their habitat. 

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