We'll be undertaking a short field project off Wai‘anae, O‘ahu, from June 20-26. This project is a bit different from our normal efforts, in that we'll be focusing on using a new tagging system, developed by Randy Wells of the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program and Michael Moore of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, to deploy single-pin finmount satellite tags to the dorsal fins of several smaller species, including spinner dolphins, bottlenose dolphins, and pantropical spotted dolphins. The tagging system, called the TADpole, deploys a single-pin tag onto the dorsal fin of bowriding dolphins, and has previously been used successfully by the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program with Atlantic spotted dolphins off Florida. These tags are expected to cause less tissue damage than our normal LIMPET tag deployments, and remain attached for longer than LIMPET tags on smaller species. We have previously used LIMPET tags on several species of small odontocetes in Hawai‘i, including bottlenose dolphins, pantropical spotted dolphins, and rough-toothed dolphins, with attachment durations that average about two weeks. We expect (and hope) that attachment durations with the single-pin finmount tag will average at least twice that time. The photo below shows one of these single-pin finmount tags on an Atlantic spotted dolphin in the Gulf of Mexico (with thanks to the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program for sharing this photo).
We will have three different types of finmount tags we are deploying, location-only Argos tags (the Wildlife Computers SPOT6 tags), a SPLASH tag that also transmits dive data, and a tag that also includes Fastloc®-GPS locations, to answer questions related to movements around and among the islands, to examine inshore/offshore movements (particularly for spinner dolphins), and to study diving behavior. Although we will primarily be focusing on deploying finmount tags on small odontocetes using the TADpole system, we'll also be working with other species of whales or dolphins we encounter, and may deploy LIMPET satellite tags on false killer whales if we encounter them.
The research team for this project will include Randy Wells and Aaron Barleycorn of the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program, Mark Mohler, Colin Cornforth, and Robin Baird of Cascadia, and a number of volunteers. This project is funded by Dolphin Quest and donations to Cascadia Research Collective.
If you have any questions, please contact Robin Baird at rwbaird (at) cascadiaresearch (dot) org.
Check back on June 21st for updates!