To Touch a Wild Dolphin by Rachel Smolker

Author:Rachel Smolker [Smolker, Rachel]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-307-79410-9
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2011-05-17T16:00:00+00:00

Andrew and I were out surveying dolphin groups. We came across the male triplet Trips, Bite, and Cetus, with Yogi, a female, and the males Realnotch, Hi, and Patches. Booboo, Yogi’s nearly independent son, was nowhere to be seen. They were incredibly wound up and excited as we approached, and the entire mob crowded together at the bow, whistling and wiggling around. One dolphin was belly up underneath another, petting and rubbing.

After a few minutes they grew bored with bowriding and went back to their business. Realnotch, Hi, and Patches were the first to leave and drifted back about one hundred feet behind the others. Trips, Bite, and Cetus were swimming in a rank abreast formation, lined up side by side and moving in perfect synchrony directly behind Yogi. Cetus suddenly rushed forward at Yogi, and there was some indecipherable splashing. Trips and Bite caught up, and they re-formed their rank behind Yogi.

Yogi was still ahead a few yards when we heard “knocks” (a sound dolphins make that is reminiscent of someone rapping their knuckles against a hollow log). The sound was coming from Cetus, whose head was partially out of the water. Yogi turned back and faced the males, then, with a kick of her tail flukes, she slid down underneath Cetus, rubbing the entire length of her body along his extended pectoral fin. When she got to her tail, she gracefully swept it upward and then swung back around to repeat the gesture. After three passes along Cetus, she settled into a snag alongside him.

Again there was a series of knocks. The water was only about eight feet deep, at the edge of a shallow weed bank, and we could see right to the bottom. Yogi dove, pointing straight down with her rostrum and poking into the weedy bottom, searching after a fish. But the three males immediately surged up at her in a fury, and she was forced to break off her hunt. Shortly thereafter there was another bout of intense splashing and chasing, mostly impossible for us to sort out, but when a dolphin’s head broke through the water surface, we could hear a harsh, screeching, growling sound in air. Whatever they were up to, it looked and sounded aggressive. They certainly weren’t just playing.

Eventually the dolphins all calmed down after a lot of circling and jawing and resumed traveling, with Yogi out front and the three males lined up, moving in perfect synchrony just behind her. Cetus then arched his head out of the water in a funny, awkward-looking position and swam in a tight circle alongside Yogi, bobbing his exposed head up and down in an odd, exaggerated motion. He seemed to be showing off to Yogi, strutting his stuff, like a peacock fanning its gaudy tail.

Every time Yogi made a move or the males suspected that she might, they charged at her, chasing, splashing, and making aggressive sounds. Then, just when things calmed down a bit, Yogi bolted. Taking off at full speed, she left a trail of flattened “fluke prints” on the water surface.

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