Legends of the Sea: The Mythical Splendor of Dolphins
Many ancient religions and cultures have drawn extensive inspiration from nature as they’ve progressed. This includes our complexly intelligent friends: dolphins. From the warm islands of Greece to the spanning rivers of India, dolphins have inspired many tales and legends from around the world. In the old Greek culture, dolphins held the role of messengers…
The Bottlenose Dolphin: Almost Human?
The bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops truncatus) is a remarkable marine mammal known for its unusually high level of intelligence. In fact, the bottlenose dolphin is the second most encephalized being on the planet after humans, meaning that they have a very large brain-to-body ratio (Grimm, 2017). The encephalization quotient (EQ) is defined as the ratio between predicted and observed brain mass for an animal of a given size. This large brain size along with other complex portions of the brain account for the great intelligence of this species. Encephalization quotient data actually suggests that the level of intelligence in the bottlenose dolphin is closer to the human range than are our nearest primate relatives (Reiss et al., 1997). So how different is dolphin cognition and psychology from humans? Bottlenose dolphins exhibit a lot of intellectual behavior similar to humans such as…
Interactions Between Humpback Whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) and Dolphins
It is strongly believed that cetaceans, which consist of whales, dolphins, and porpoises, are some of the more intelligent species that exist alongside human beings on this planet. Naturally, due to this high level of intelligence, they are more likely to have interactions with other individuals. These individuals can be members of their own species,…
The Water Quality in Cape May, New Jersey and its Effects on Bottlenose Dolphins
The Water Quality in Cape May, New Jersey and its Effects on Bottlenose Dolphins Mary Jacketti Intern at Cape May Whale Watch and Research Center, University of Miami Abstract The purpose of this study was to determine if the Atlantic Ocean or Delaware Bay in Southern New Jersey was clean or polluted. We…
Why Dolphins Have Blurry Vision Under Water
If you have ever been on a tour with the Cape May Whale Watch and Research Center, you have heard your naturalist explain that dolphins are mammals. They may swim and look like a fish, but they are not fish. Mammals have hair; they are endothermic; they produce milk for their young. However, there…
Investigating Trends and Patterns of Surface Water Temperature in Bottlenose Dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) off Cape May, New Jersey
Stockton University Research Symposium – Spring 2017 To view a high quality PDF, please email Melissa Laurino at [email protected]