An Epic Day Of Dolphins (And Turtles)
Category: Cetacean research, Dolphins, Kisite Mpunguti MPA, Turtles | Date: May 01 2009 | By: gvikenya
Keziah gives us the news from yesterday’s marine research:
I woke up 6am in Shimoni, waiting to find out when the boat would come to pick me up at the jetty. With the rainy season, start times of marine surveys become a wee bit unpredictable - with one eye on the rain clouds you just have to wait for the opportunity! However, the sun was shining, there was no sign of rain and a phone call later I was jogging through Shimoni village to the boat.
We headed out towards Funzi Bay, across Nyuli Reef and to Upper Mpunguti Island when we had our first sighting of dolphins, something that has also become less predictable with the season. At first we thought there were eleven Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphins, but soon realised this was an underestimation. Ten on the port side, ten on the starboard side, we didn’t know quite where to look, excitedly swapping sides with a chorus of gasps and squeals from our team, and splashes and blows from the dolphins.
Several individuals were identified immediately, including one of my favourite pairs; Besty and her calf. I had the pleasure to be on the boat when we spotted Besty and her newborn calf for the first time, adorably small with the foetal folds still showing! Others including Twende and the yet to be named individual ‘063’ were also identified.
The group were at first travelling fast in a southerly direction, then their pace slowed, with a couple of individuals approaching the boat to bow ride. This enabled us to get good shots of the dorsal fins, which will be used for photo-identification in our mark-recapture study. Unfortunately we also noticed an adult and juvenile that appeared skinny compared to the rest, with their ribs visible. We hope this wasn’t a sign of illness in the population or lack of food in the area… After taking enough photos we left them to continue south to the open sea.
The dolphins had done us a service, leading us to the start of the snorkel transect our survey leader had selected for the day, by Kisite Island… and it turned out to be the perfect day to pick this transect! As we climbed out of the water to board the boat post-survey, everyone’s face was an absolute picture: 3 hawksbill turtles, 5 green turtles and 1 moray eel! Ruth and I even had the pleasure of watching one of the green turtles swim slowly to the surface, stop for a few seconds and then continue to raise its head out the water, beak open for a gasp of air. This was closely followed by us both surfacing and giggling hysterically with joy having witnessed a behaviour in full that we had only seen before from above the surface as a turtle’s head appear and disappear in a second!
With the weather being on our side, we decided to return towards Funzi Bay again, but the sea was just a little too rough, so we diverted in to Wasini channel. Within 5 minutes of turning the boat around there was a shout from Katalin at the front, “DOLPHIN”, followed quickly by “HUMPBACK DOLPHIN!”. We had to wait 10 minutes for the individual to reappear, a very large Indo-Pacific humpback dolphin that seemed curiously darker than usual. We put this down to the glare of the sun, and waited for what we thought was a lone individual to resurface. Then two individuals surfaced riding a wave, both smaller than the first. Several more minutes of waiting and we were shocked to see not only the three individuals from before, but another two adults and calf!
We continued to watch them for 20 minutes as they were feeding, coming up for several breaths before peduncle dives took them under for several minutes. After surfacing for the third time, in unison, they formed a compact group, changed direction and headed south, crossing the channel towards Wasini Island. We were able to compare the colouration of the first individual and yes, he was distinctly darker, not something we had seen before. The mother of the calf had a deep scar around her neck, possibly from a fishing line. Only 2 weeks ago an individual was spotted with a huge chunk out the back of his dorsal fin, the shape suggestive of a boat propeller injury. Both these wounds emphasize the humpback dolphin’s vulnerability to fishing activities, boat traffic and marine debris around coast lines. But fortunately also an ability to recover from significant injury.
All in all it was quite an epic day for our research team and for me one of complete brilliance!
Tags: bottlenose dolphin, Cetacean research, dolphin research, funzi bay, green turtle, hawksbill turtle, humpback dolphin, Kisite Mpunguti MPA, turtle research, wasini channel
Marine Research Through the Eyes of a Naval Officer
Category: Cetacean research, Dolphins, Kenya Wildlife Service, Kisite Mpunguti MPA, Turtles | Date: Apr 27 2009 | By: gvikenya
Jon “JR” Olson is a U.S Naval Attache based in Helsinki. He has come to the south coast of kenya for two weeks to join GVI in its marine research project in the Kisite-Mpunguti Marine Protected Area. He has kindly written this blog about his first day as part of the research team.
The 0530 alarm went off next to my head and, at first, I forgot where I was. Then, the heat and humidity of the early Kenyan coastal morning kicked in as I peeled off the sheet from my sweating body. While some would be put off by this rather uncomfortable fact, I, personally, felt exhilarated as this was to be my first official day working as a member of the dolphin research project in the Kisite Mpunguti Marine Protected Area.
By 0600 I was showered, had organized by personal snorkel gear, camera, sunscreen, some additional clothes, etc, and was in the kitchen eating a quick breakfast. I was the new guy and had to prove to the GVI veterans I could contribute to this project. Contribution started with me helping to fix breakfast, cleaning up the kitchen area afterwards, packing the equipment for the day, etc. By 0630 our group of nine people was hauling the gear down to the water and loading up SQUIRREL, our shuttle boat. A few minutes later we were motoring our way across the Wasini Channel bound for Shimoni Village and our moored research boat known as BARDAN. After transferring our gear to BARDAN, we got underway on our search for dolphins and other marine life.
Within minutes of starting out, we spotted our first pod of bottlenose dolphins, right in the middle of the Wasini Channel. We spent 45 minutes following a pod of seven dolphins as they transited west down the channel. We took dozens of photographs, logged the entire event, and ended the sighting around 0745. BARDAN then turned east and we headed out into deeper water destined for Kisite Island by way of Funzi Bay. We motored slowly under cloudy skies, which, on this particular morning, considering my still pasty white flesh, was OK with me. The conditions were absolutely perfect for searching the seas for pods of dolphin and other marine species. And, as luck would have it, while transiting south from Funzi Bay, we spooked a large surfacing turtle which promptly inhaled deeply and rapidly dove back into the deep.
Photograph showing a bottlenose dolphin feeding on a turtle
Some two hours after we departed Shimoni, we arrived in the channel area of the Kisite Mpunguti islands. It was not long before we spotted a small group of tourist dive boats and we set course for those boats as it was likely they would be accompanied by some type of marine life. Once again, we were lucky and as we arrived in the vicinity of the tourist boats, we spotted a number of pairs of bottlenose dolphins, all of them engaged in socializing behaviors, and possibly some feeding. We tracked these pairs of dolphins using cameras, the event and sighting logs, and maintained contact for approximately 30 minutes. The dolphins then disappeared and we began making our way toward our snorkeling destination near Kisite Island where we would snorkel a defined path, known as a transect, in search of more turtles.
Once in the water, which, to me, feels like bath water because it is so warm, we started our transect and were not disappointed after sighting three turtles, two of which we were able to specifically classify as Green Turtles.
A bottlenose dolphin with scars that are believed to be the result of a shark attack
Once back in the boat at the end of our snorkel phase, we logged the information on the turtles in the Mega Fauna log and then proceeded back to the northeast, heading back to base for lunch and afternoon of data entry into the computers and some time spent correlating dolphin photos with individual dolphins. It was amazing to me to see the truly distinctive dorsal fin marks on each of the local, or resident, bottlenose dolphins listed in the photographic data base. After expert tutelage by GVI intern Karen, I was able to quickly identify a number of dolphins in the data base with photos taken by other research teams, providing much needed data for GVI to inform the Kenya Wildlife Service about key aspects of dolphin behavior. This information will allow KWS to develop better policies for protecting the Marine Protected Area, which will, in turn, protect the bottlenose dolphins habitat.
As I finish this blog, I realize it is almost 10PM and I have to get up again shortly after 0500 tomorrow morning. I get to do it all over again! I can’t wait!
Tags: bottlenose dolphin, Cetacean research, funzi, green turtle, kisite mpunguti marine protected area, marine protected areas, mkwiro, shimoni, turtle
Marine Research Through the Eyes of a Naval Officer
Category: Cetacean research, Dolphins, Kenya Wildlife Service, Kisite Mpunguti MPA, Turtles | Date: Mar 16 2009 | By: gvikenya
Jon “JR” Olson is a U.S Naval Attache based in Helsinki. He has joined GVIs marine research proramme on the south coast of kenya for 2 weeks. He has kindly writtten this blog about his first day out on the water.
I woke up feeling exhilarated as this was to be my first official day working as a member of the dolphin research project in the Kisite/Mpunguti Marine Protected Area.
By 0600 I was showered, had organized by personal snorkel gear, camera, sunscreen, some additional clothes, etc, and was in the kitchen eating a quick breakfast. By 0630 our group of nine people was hauling the gear down to the water and loading up SQUIRREL, our shuttle boat. A few minutes later we were motoring our way across the Wasini Channel bound for Shimoni Village and our moored research boat known as BARDAN. After transferring our gear to BARDAN, we got underway on our search for dolphins and other marine life.
Within minutes of starting out, we spotted our first pod of bottlenose dolphins, right in the middle of the Wasini Channel. We spent 45 minutes following a pod of seven dolphins as they transited west down the channel. We took dozens of photographs, logged the entire event, and ended the sighting around 0745. BARDAN then turned east and we headed out into deeper water destined for Kisite Island by way of Funzi Bay. We motored slowly under cloudy skies, which, on this particular morning, considering my still pasty white flesh, was OK with me.
Bottlenose dolphin feeding on a turtle
The conditions were absolutely perfect for searching the seas for pods of dolphin and other marine species. And, as luck would have it, while transiting south from Funzi Bay, we spooked a large surfacing turtle which promptly inhaled deeply and rapidly dove back into the deep.
Some two hours after we departed Shimoni, we arrived in the channel area of the Kisite Mpunguti islands. It was not long before we spotted a small group of tourist dive boats and we set course for those boats as it was likely they would be accompanied by some type of marine life. Once again, we were lucky and as we arrived in the vicinity of the tourist boats, we spotted a number of pairs of bottlenose dolphins, all of them engaged in socializing behaviors, and possibly some feeding. We tracked these pairs of dolphins using cameras, the event and sighting logs, and maintained contact for approximately 30 minutes. The dolphins then disappeared and we began making our way toward our snorkeling destination near Kisite Island where we would snorkel a defined path, known as a transect, in search of more turtles.
A bottlenose dolphin with severe scarring. Thought to be the result of a shark attack
Once in the water, which, to me, feels like bath water because it is so warm, we started our transect and were not disappointed after sighting three turtles, two of which we were able to specifically classify as Green Turtles. Once back in the boat at the end of our snorkel phase, we logged the information on the turtles in the Mega Fauna log and then proceeded back to the northeast, heading back to base for lunch and afternoon of data entry into the computers and some time spent correlating dolphin photos with individual dolphins.
It was amazing to me to see the truly distinctive dorsal fin marks on each of the local, or resident, bottlenose dolphins listed in the photographic data base. After expert tutelage by GVI intern Karen, I was able to quickly identify a number of dolphins in the data base with photos taken by other research teams, providing much needed data for GVI to inform the Kenya Wildlife Service about key aspects of dolphin behavior. This information will allow KWS to develop better policies for protecting the Marine Protected Area, which will, in turn, protect the bottlenose dolphins habitat.
As I finish this blog, I realize it is almost 10PM and I have to get up again shortly after 0500 tomorrow morning. I get to do it all over again! I can’t wait!
Tags: , bottlenose dolphin, green turtle, marine research, shark
Spinner Dolphins East of Kisite-Mpunguti Marine Protected Area
Category: Cetacean research, Dolphins, Kisite Mpunguti MPA, Turtles | Date: Jan 29 2009 | By: gvikenya
It doesn’t happen as often as I’d like with so much else going on but yesterday I joined the marine research team, 6.30am departure aboard our research vessel ‘Lampard’, on calm waters with the rising sun to warm us…
I take the tiller, captaining the boat east out of the Wasini channel, the rest of the team assume positions for dedicated watch. Passing the coastal forest of Shimoni I spot a colobus in the canopy and an African Fish Eagle… but today is the marine research programme, and it’s dolphins and turtles that we search for.
Rounding the south-east corner of Shimoni peninsula we enter Funzi bay, hoping to spot Indo-Pacific humpback dolphins that favour these near-shore habitats. No sign of them today. We pass a green turtle, but sadly a recently dead one floating at the water’s surface. No obvious cause of death, but this time of the year, during the kaskazi winds (the NE monsoon winds), seems to bring a peak of turtle mortalities each year. Much of Funzi bay is shallow and doesn’t leave us much room to manouvre so we turn the boat around and head south, towards the continental shelf and open water. A flock of terns dives persistently at the water’s surface but the fish shoal they target has gone unoticed by any dolphin.
A more distant splash and a suspected dolphin sigthing, something dark and rounded surfacing. Half-way there before it becomes evident it’s another dead turtle bobbing at the surface. A huge one this time, a hawksbill, it’s been dead for longer and given the size it reached, somehow a sadder loss as we circle around it and continue our route south.
Sergi, our marine research officer takes over from me at the stern as I join the rotation of observers up front, each with our 45 degree field of view to patrol. Tom calls out a potential dolphin far ahead, an apparent leap and splash, Sergi steers us toward the point on the horizon and we keep scanning the surface. We rotate positions, both Tom and I looking forward, he sees something again, but is disappointed when there’s no following dorsal fins or repeat splashes.
Still we head further south, further from the shore and are rewarded 15 minutes later by 4 dorsal fins breaking the water’s surface ahead. They approach the boat to ride the bow and a further 3 dorsal fins join them. We expect them to be Indian Ocean bottlenose dolphins out here, but the small triangular fins, the smaller torpedo-like bodies and the long narrow beaks all point to something different. Three tone body colouration as they surface confirms we have found a small group of spinner dolphins.
Sergi hands me the camera, I try to get photos of the dorsal fins of each one as they sruface to breathe. It’s not as easy as it seems it should be. Unpredicatable quite where and when they will surface as they dart across the bow just below the surface, the angle has to be right, the sun behind, sharp focus… and you have to be quick. Sergi uses the time to talk the team of observers through the dolphins’ behaviour. Close to the surface, regular slow shallow surfacing, no obvious directional travel; they were probably resting. We leave the small group and within minutes an apparent lone individual further away leaps from the water, an acrobatic spin that gives them their name. Then 10 dorsal fins surface to our right. We barely get through counting them when at least 20 fins appear on the right. Our group of 7 was actually part of a larger group, in the end we estimate 40 to 50 individuals.
Spinner dolphins are thought to be seasonal visitors to this part of the Kenyan coast, possibly crossing the channel from Pemba, following the food with the kaskazi. In previous years we have recorded them between mid-February to mid-March, in large active groups (up to and over 200) off the shelf, south of the MPA. This kaskazi we had one sighting in December, and then last week. We do not think that this season represents any ‘break from the routine’ but more likely that our new research vessel gives us a higher, clearer viewing platform, and survey routes take us further from shore so we simply see more. The real exctitement is that we are now understanding more about these seasonal visitors; their ’season’ is longer than we first thoguht, and they are using habitats east of the MPA for resting suggesting they may be here for more than just quick foraging forays. Ironically, the fact that they are consistenly recorded outside of the marine protected area is not of too great concern. They are free from disturbance by the dolphin-watching tourist boats and in the absence of commercial fishing activities are not threatened here by high levels of accidental deaths from by-catch that plague some of their open-ocean counter-parts through industries such as tuna fisheries which are yet to be quite as ‘dolphin-friendly’ as we might be lead to believe.
I’ll keep you posted throughout our ’spinner season’…
Tags: African Fish Eagle, Colobus, dolphin research, green turtle, hawksbill turtle, Kisite Mpunguti MPA, spinner dolphin
Perspectives from Tom, our Marine Research Volunteer
Category: Cetacean research, Dolphins, Turtles, Uncategorized | Date: Jan 27 2009 | By: gvikenya
Tom O’Dell travelled from the UK to assist us with our marine research programme so we thought we’d share is perspectives on the work and the life out here in Kenya…
I think I am a little different to the others here, everyone else is involved in some type of conservation work, or has spent, or is spending months travelling. Not me!
I am a so-called IT professional who was owed a couple of week’s holiday and can’t stand the idea of sitting on a beach reading and sunning myself for days on end. I had two weeks, no plans, a hatred of being bored and fancied something different , so I packed my bags and headed off to Kenya to do a couple of weeks marine conservation work. That was two weeks ago, and I am sitting here, on my last day wondering how I can wangle more time off work.
To say the conditions here are rustic is a small understatement, there’s no fresh water except that which is collected when it rains, the shower facilities consist of a bucket and jug on the floor and the toilet is, literally, a hole in the floor. And with all this “rusticness” comes probably the greatest sense of community and togetherness I have ever experienced.
You are never alone here, unless you want to be. If you are feeling under the weather, everyone does whatever they can to help you out (I have had my fair share of acclimatization problems); if you are feeling down, they will do whatever it takes to cheer you up and if you do want some time to yourself, then they will leave you to it.
Despite my intentions, being here is not a holiday, you work most days, cooking, cleaning, building, but everyone has their jobs and everyone helps out each other where they can, adding to the sense of community.
Working on marine conservation is quite simply amazing. The best way to describe it is probably to quote a text I sent a friend of mine back home; “Typical day, up just before sunrise, have breakfast and traipsed down to the boat. Watched the sun come up across the water then started “work”. 7am, watching a pod of bottlenose dolphins feeding about 20 meters away from the boat; 10am snorkeling on a reef looking for turtles, managed to photo a green before it swam away; 11.30am back on the boat heading home for lunch, took a slight detour to watch some humpback dolphins socializing. Back at base to learn about the dolphins and turtles we saw, relax in a hammock, do a little computer work, then dinner and drink in Paradise. Wednesday tomorrow, more of the same”. Let’s just say the response I received was blunt (she was a little envious).
Were it possible, I would stay out here longer, and I definitely heading back to explore further. Unfortunately, the “modern world” beckons. I’ve been two weeks without television, internet access, cars, running water, microwave and have only sent and received 10 texts in total which for a so called IT professional borders on heresy, and I’ve loved every minute of it.
Tags: bottlenose dolphin, dolphin research, green turtle, humpback dolphin, Kenya, volunteer
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