Bottle nose dolphins

Dolphins live in large water bodies which may either be salty or fresh waters. They are thirty two types of dolphins where by bottle nose dolphin is on of them. Bottle nose dolphins are taxonomically classified as follows; they belong to the class animalia, order- catecea, sub order-odontoceti, family-delphinidae, genus-turssiops and speacies-truncutus. Bottle nose dolphin is the most well known cetaceans’. This is due to its use in marine parks, research activities, and in navy sensing example it’s used by United States navy to sense an enemy. The bottle nose dolphin is mostly found at along the shores of United States.Through research scientists have been able to show that they are two species of bottle nose dolphins existing. The common one is turssiops trancutus which is found in most warm tropical oceans. Their color sometimes almost blue has a dark line from beak to blowhole. The second type of bottle nose dolphin is the indo-Pacific bottle nose dolphin turssiops aduncus living in waters around India-Australia and south china. Bottle nose dolphin hunting and strategies Bottle nose dolphin show aggressive behavior in its environment as they pursue prey and predators they fight among themselves when they are competing for food.Some researchers’ have established that some species of bottle nose dolphins kill harbor porpoises. However they do not eat them but they just kill the porpoises to reduce competition for food. Dolphins have large dorsal fins which help in movement, the fins will a dolphin to quickly attack its prey, the fins therefore play a major role in hunting where if the fins were not large enough it would be very difficult for the dolphin to feed. The main menu of the bottle nose dolphin consist of small fish and occasionally feed on squid, crabs ,shrimp and other small animals.Normally they have got cone-shaped strong teeth which they use to grasp their prey. Each bottle nose dolphin is capable of hunting for its own food, but when they are many they apply some skills and strategy whereby they communicate through squeaks, whistles, body language, slapping of tails and butting of head to alert fellow dolphins on presence of food source. They are able to direct a shoal of fish and keep them together as they kill and eat them. They also practice fish whacking where by the stunned fish and thrown out of water where it is easily caught.Bottle nose dolphins also locate prey by producing sound and latter listening to the echo. The echo is transmitted through two small ears near the eye . thus when the echo is returning the object of interest is approached as the echo grows louder. This process of hunting is called etholocation. Bottle nose dolphins have got a strong signal sense; advanced spectral qualities which are well distributed thus help in echolocation qualities. The bottle nose dolphins have sharp eye sight located at the sides of the head and have a reflecting membrane at the back of their retina w hich aids vision in time of dim light.They are also able to both in deep water and air. Conclusion: From the above discussion it is clear that Bottle noser dolphins have unique hunting skills, they have large dorsal fins that help in fast movement which help it catch its food, there are however many types of dolphins, there are over 32 types of dolphins which have differing characteristics and hunting strategies. References: Sea world organization (2008) bottle nose dolphins, retrieved on 26th May, available at http://www. seaworld. org/infobooks/Bottlenose/home. html