WDCS have seven bottlenose dolphins available for adoption and each month publish ‘Dolphin Diaries’ to keep donors updated on what the dolphins have been up to. Here’s what’s been happening in July:

Story of the month (or year) has to be about Mischief . At long last and after thinking that I would never get good enough photos to prove gender either way……Mischief is a BOY!

I found it hard to believe after watching this wonderful big dolphin for years. He’s often surrounded by young dolphins and babysitting while the mothers are hunting. Male dolphins don’t usually take any role in bringing up the young calves – maybe Mischief is a ‘new man’ as far as dolphin societies go. Barbara Cheney from the Aberdeen University Lighthouse Field Station thought Mischief was a male and she was proved right, but I’m delighted at being wrong!

It’s been a good month for social activity amongst the dolphins. It started with lots of chasing and breaching going on and looked like great fun. Talking of fun, the chief funster himself, Sundance, was having a great time with Rainbow’s big lad, Prism, thrilling the crowds at Chanonry Point, as was Rainbow herself. She was hunting with her pal Zephyr until Moonlight and a few others came along and then they had a mad five minutes too.

Nevis was also around a lot, nearly always in the company of Rainbow. I had a glimpse of Spirit and Sparkle too but they looked as though they were heading somewhere and didn’t stop.

All the dolphins are on the hunt at this time of the year with all senses sharpened to detect any presence of the big salmon that are once again swimming in from the open sea. By mid-month, heavy rains had raised the river levels and have increased the dolphin activity. Nevis was being very entertaining, hunting almost up on the beach one day with a lovely fish in mid-air just a few feet away from his snout and the same can be said of Moonlight who suddenly appeared from nowhere and immediately ran into a beautiful big fish. This must have been very annoying for Sundance who was still waiting to catch his first salmon of the tide.

Spirit and Sparkle were spotted by Barbara with their usual group, out beyond Cromarty, and she reported they were looking good!

The weather was changeable in the second half of the month and so was the routine and behaviour of our dolphins. I prayed for rain to bring some salmon in from the open sea and boy did we get some. It’s been many years since I’ve been as wet at Chanonry as I was the other day. So much for waterproof clothing – I was soaked to the skin! Looking on the bright side, I did manage to get photos of five out of the seven adoption dolphins in a variety of activities; mostly hunting and making big splashes as they connect with a big fish, or just missing it and spinning round to rush off in hot pursuit.

Sundance has been up to his usual nonsense, aided and abetted by Rainbow’s big son, Prism – Rainbow herself quietly gets on with the most important job of the day: finding food.

Nevis has not been around every day but trundles along sometimes in the company of the other big males, stopping off to hunt at the Point a couple of times. He seems to have some scheme that he’s cooking up around Cromarty and is spending more time out there, maybe rounding up mackerel as a change to the intermittent salmon supplies.

Via WDCS Adopt a Dolphin Update – July 2009

Each WDCS Adopt a Dolphin donor receives monthly updates like the one above. Find out more on adopting a dolphin.