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Common Bottlenose Dolphin

Intelligent, curious, and playful, the common bottlenose dolphin is one of the most familiar and beloved marine mammals in the world. Found in oceans worldwide, these dolphins are known for their acrobatics, social behavior, and charismatic personalities.

 

The common bottlenose dolphin has a sleek, streamlined body that helps it glide through the water with ease. Adults are about 2.4 meters (8 feet) long and weigh anywhere from 135 to 635 kilograms (300 to 14,000 pounds), with males typically larger than females. They are found in seas around the globe, except in polar waters, and can even be spotted in bays, estuaries, and harbors. 

They are incredibly social animals, living in pods of around 13-16, although they can include over 100 individuals. These pods often are made up of subgroups that frequently split up and come back together with the primary pod. Highly intelligent, bottlenose dolphins communicate between individuals using both audible sounds, like clicks and whistles, and echolocation, which the dolphins also use to navigate their surroundings and detect prey such as fish, squid, and crustaceans. They will hunt both independently and cooperatively, sometimes working together to herd fish into groups or trap them against the shore or a sandbar for an easy meal. 

Female common bottlenose dolphins typically give birth to a single calf, which stays with their mother for between 3 and 6 years. Mothers provide parental care, nursing their calves while also protecting them from predators like sharks, playing with them, and even disciplining them. Because of the amount of maternal care, female dolphins only give birth every 3-6 years. 

 

 

Although they are not endangered, bottlenose dolphins do face human-made threats such as bycatch, habitat destruction and degradation from pollutants like oil spills, and entanglement in ocean plastics.

 

 

Oceana campaigns to reduce harmful bycatch, protect critical habitats, reduce single-use plastic pollution at the source, and stop dirty and dangerous offshore drilling — all efforts that help safeguard dolphins and countless other marine species.

 

 

 

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