Bottlenose dolphins always tops
By Lloyd Edwards

1. News

While doing some whale watching out of San Diego towards Mexico, I chatted to the official photographer onboard, Michael Peak. He informed me that Bottlenose dolphins on his site always generated the most interest. I argued with him and said that breaching humpback whales or Long-beaked common dolphins were the most popular. How wrong I was!

Michael came to South Africa and did our cruises along the Alexandria Dunefields. That day we came across a large school of Indo-Pacific bottlenose surfing and breaching out of the waves. He took some photos and put them straight onto his marine animal website. Before we had returned to port, he had more hits than he had ever had on any other post! These charismatic animals with their broad smile just simply have the edge over the other marine mammals.

It was because of this that I started researching about the number of Bottlenose dolphins that use Algoa Bay, compared to other sites around the world. The closest was somewhere in Australia that boasted a population of 4000 for 6 months of the year. This was nothing compared to the 28 500 (and climbing) Bottlenose dolphins that make use of Algoa Bay every day of the year.

It was for this reason we had our bay officially proclaimed as the “Bottlenose Dolphin Capital of the World”. 

Read and learn more about Bottlenose dolphins of Algoa Bay