Memorable swimming with dolphins

You can see the remora on the left side of the dolphin in this picture

This individual also appeared to have an odd skin colouration which could have been a disease, or parts of the white spots could be scars. 

Dolphin with odd colouration

Then, having a closer look, it had a lot of pseudo stalked barnacles on the pectoral fins which, with this amount, was quite unusual. All in all, this individual, unfortunately, did not look very healthy. She did give us quite a show with her leaps and turns, to get rid of the remora. We managed to get a shot of the dolphin where we were able to determine the sex. A female dolphin has 2 mammary slits on the belly next to the genital slit. 

You can see the pseudo stalked barnacles on the pectoral fins of this female. Also, in this picture you can see genital and mammary slits

After being with these dolphins, we continued to try to find another species. As we were traveling, we encountered more and more small groups of spotted dolphins; the sea was full of them today! Eventually our lookout had called us to see a second species of the day, the bottlenose dolphin. This group was also social and turning underneath the catamaran. They were curious today as well. 

 

We however did not stay very long, as we had quite a journey to get back to Ponta Delgada. On the way there and back some of our boats managed to see some loggerhead turtles and the Bulwer’s storm petrel. One of our boats even saw a Sei whale next to the spotted dolphins, however it disappeared quite soon after the sighting. Of course we cannot control nature.

In the afternoon the first species to show up was the striped dolphin. They were very close to shore and at a certain moment very calm in the surface something that is not so usual with this species. In general, they were keeping some distance from the boat because usually, these dolphins aren’t so interested in these boats as some other species. We left them behind and we continued our quest to find other species. 

 

After some time of just seeing waves, out of the blue some dorsal fins started to cut the surface of the water. A gigantic group of Atlantic spotted dolphins. They were just traveling together but as soon as the boats arrived at the area they started to swim in our direction in full speed. These species are one of the most curious dolphins we have around here, often we see them playing with the waves of the boat and swimming really close to the boat while turning in the side to look to us. 

Our swimming boats in the afternoon had a very memorable moment in the water. When they arrived at the area of the spotted dolphins the boats noticed something really big in the water. It was a huge ball of fish that the dolphins were feeding on. The swimming boats had a real National Geographic moment!