POPCORN Still Thriving In Algoa Bay
By Jake Keeton

Wednesday, 8th October 2025

Back in April 2023, the owner of Raggy Charters Lloyd Edwards, was the first to spot a newly born Albino Bottlenose Dolphin Calf in Algoa Bay. This unique looking calf was named "Popcorn" by the public and soon rose to fame amongst locals and tourists. People travelled from far and wide to join us on a cruise hoping to see and photograph Popcorn. Many of these people were fortunate to see Popcorn as finding the young albino calf was a regular occurrence during our Whale, Dolphin and Penguin Island cruises in 2023 and 2024. During the last three months of 2024 and the beginning of 2025 Popcorn gave us a few scares by disappearing for a few weeks at a time. With the albino calf standing out so much amongst the other dolphins, our fear was always that Popcorn had succumbed to predation by a large shark species or killer whales. After these periods of absence, Popcorns return to Algoa Bay was always celebrated by all who have become fond of the young albino calf.

Early this year Popcorn had us more worried than ever. After seeing Popcorn on 17 February, month after month went by without seeing him/her. What made it worse was the fact that we would regularly see other dolphins that we knew to be members of the same pod that Popcorn is a part of. Due to this we started to come to terms with the possibility that we had seen Popcorn for the last time.

Finally on Wednesday 8 October, after 8 months, we caught a glimpse of a white dorsal fin in the shallows near Pollock Beach. We had to be certain that what we saw was in fact Popcorn before we shared the exciting news with our guests on board. A short while later, with the aid of a long lens I was certain that it was Popcorn in the middle of the pod. We were not able to safely get close to the pod as they were very close to the shore break in shallow water. We spent some time observing the pod from a distance and trying our best to capture a decent photograph of Popcorn. Although these are not the best pictures I have ever taken of Popcorn, I was so happy with what I managed to get as they confirmed two things; one, that Popcorn was still alive and two, that Popcorn has grown rather large over the last 8 months!

We have a number of individual dolphins in Algoa Bay that are easy to identify due to various abnormalities. The ones that stand out the most are:
Popcorn (the famous Albino);
Holy (an adult female with a neat hole in the centre of her dorsal fin);
Heavy Breather (an adult with a deformed blow hole causing a loud prolonged breath);
Harry (a common Dolphin that has joined a pod of bottlenose);
Split-Fin (dorsal fin split down the middle) and
Dolf (has no dorsal fin).

We know that the Heavy Breather and Dolf are both members of the same pod of about 150 strong that Popcorn belongs to. We find it very interesting that throughout Popcorns absence we still saw these individuals and the rest of the pod with no Popcorn in Sight. Sounds to us like a research project in the making!

We will be sure to keep an eye out for Popcorn during our upcoming cruises in Algoa bay. Keep an eye on our page for updates!