Mud plume feeding…ALMOST captured!

Heading out for another survey (Photo: JLewis, TDRF)

The dolphins we study off the lower Florida keys have a really neat feeding behavior called mud plume feeding. To do this, dolphins create a U shaped plume of mud in the water, and then lunge through it to catch fish(http://www.tropicaldolphin.org/ResearchFeedingHowDoThey.html). 

We have been documenting them doing this since 1999. But we still have many unanswered questions. Like how many times they are successful at catching fish when they do this?

To examine it….means a waiting game must be underway. First we have to wait for the tides to be just right and then the time of day. Then we have to locate dolphins over the right habitat where they perform the behavior…and finally then the dolphins have to perform the behavior (they don’t always).

Now that we are filming from above….with a quadcopter…we also need two further criteria…..no rain and low wind.

Blip (Photo: JLewis, TDRF)

Today we got all of the above….with the exception of enough mud plumes to give us time to get the copter into the air to film it. We had run into two old dolphin friends….Poweraide and Blip. After a few hours they finally moved into an area where they do mud plume feed…and then they started to do it….and almost as soon as they started they stopped and then moved into deeper water.  

Poweraide (Photo: JLewis, TDRF)