We all know that dolphins are intelligent and active creatures that share the world with us. There are some dolphin facts that not many of us are aware of since we don’t often associate with them. In case you want to know what dolphins have done or more facts about dolphins, you are at the right place. There are many cool and weird things about dolphins that not many people expect. Below, we have 10 dolphin facts that you might want to know about so let’s find out with us.
1Dolphins Are Territorial
Not many people know that dolphins are territorial. First, they claim territory and then control them in hierarchical structures. Pods is the name of this structure, and there are subgroups of dolphins with different goals in the team. So three dolphins will have the team objective of capturing and herding female dolphins. There are other groups of 4 to 14 dolphins that attack other groups of dolphins to steal their females. Yes, that happened. Meanwhile, large pods of dolphins can have up to 1,000 members or more.
On top of that, the pods also have diplomat dolphins that go to communicate with opposing factions. That can lead to two groups joining forces in order to dominate other groups of dolphins. Or even better, form an alliance against a group larger than both of theirs. Just like humans, sometimes dolphins may become traitors due to the influence of enemy diplomat dolphins. Unbelievable as it may sound, this is actually true.
2Dolphins Can Talk
Scientists in Crimea discovered that dolphins can actually speak to each other in a way that resembles human words. Dolphins can make a series of noises including pulses, clicks, and whistles which they can understand the purposes in their communication. Using all of these sounds can create up to hundreds of words or even more. Yet, those words can create up to thousands of sentences in their language.
If one dolphin is making or emitting noises, the others would quietly wait and listen before replying with their own voices. Dolphins can communicate with one another over the telephone, and appear to know who they are talking to as well. Because of that, researchers are now looking into how to talk to animals via their languages. It is possible that we will be able to talk with animals in the future, and that might begin with dolphins.
3Dolphins’ Gifted Skills
Do you know that dolphins can stay up to 5 days without sleeping? Also, when sleeping, dolphins tend to sleep with one of their eyes open as part of a defense mechanism. At the same time, dolphins sleep by resting half of their brains at a time. Another study found that dolphins could stay alert for a total of 15 days, but they cannot breathe underwater. The good thing is they can stay underwater for a total of 17 minutes without breathing.
4Dolphins In Military Training
With proper training sessions, the US and other navies can train dolphins to seek underwater mines and mark them. Then human divers will go down and disarm the marked mines, and this also allows tankers to travel through dangerous areas safely. The awesome thing is no one can tell which dolphins are ordinary and which are the skillful ones. So they can slip past the Iranian and other armies easily without being noticed. Such a dangerous combination, but somehow very useful and helpful.
5Dolphins Kill Their Babies
Dolphins do not only kill baby porpoises but also babies of their own species as well. Male dolphins will kill the infants of the female dolphins in order to mate with them. By committing infanticide, it causes the females to immediately become ready to have children. That explains the undeciphered killing sprees of the Scottish and American dolphins as well as the baby porpoises. However, the only unexplained thing is why that only happens in just two specific areas.
6Dolphins’ Penises
Don’t get me wrong, the thing is that dolphins have the most unusual penises with unbelievable functions, better than humans’. Their penises are multi-purpose which means it is capable of doing more than just mating since they function more like hands. That means dolphins use their penises to touch and feel things around them just like we use our hands. No doubt why there are people who thought that dolphins raped them or tried to rape them. The truth is our lively friends just use their “hand” on something they don’t and shouldn’t interact with.
7Dolphins’ Teeth
Dolphins don’t use those tiny teeth they have for chewing at all, the teeth are actually for grasping. More than that, dolphins have no jaw muscles for chewing which means they swallow their food whole. Dolphins are also extreme eaters since they eat about 33 pounds of fish daily which equals to humans eating 15 – 22 pounds of steak. The best part is that dolphins can eat that much without gaining weight at all.
Every year, a dolphin’s teeth grow a new layer which is similar to the rings inside a tree trunk. Just like trees, scientists can tell how old a dolphin is from the layers on its teeth. A dolphin can live up to 17 to 40 years while some can live as long as 50 years or above.
8Dolphins’ Way Of Giving Birth
In case you don’t know, dolphins and whales give birth to the tail first instead of the head. After mating, the gestation period begins and takes about 12 months while it will be from 11 to 17 months for killer whales. When the single calf is born, there will be the help of another female dolphin in the role of a midwife. Then the dolphin mothers give birth to the calf by releasing the tail first to avoid the newborn from drowning.
9The Unsolved Dolphin Murder Spree
Would you believe that dolphins actually engage in murdering baby porpoises? Yes, there is evidence for that. At first, people thought that baby porpoises were killed by weapon tests, but evidence showed that the killer was a dolphin. The thing is that dolphins can use echolocation to locate the vital organs of the infants and aim for those spots.
When attack, the adult dolphins pummel the babies and throw them into the air. Even worse, they won’t stop chasing the youngsters unless those babies die. The strange thing is there are only two places where dolphins kill baby porpoises: Virginia Coast & Scotland’s Northeast Coast. The reasons behind the killing are still under research by scientists.
10Unexpected Dolphins
Killer Whales are actually dolphins of enormous size that most people thought were whales. These killing machines are so smart, and the experts can train them just like dolphins due to their intelligence. The combination of the large size and cleverness makes killer whales one of the most dangerous predators in the ocean. The menu of killer whales consists of pretty much anything including great white sharks and other fierce predators. As a matter of fact, killer whales are on top of the food chain in the ocean, yes the huge dolphins.
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