Long-Beaked Common Dolphins In Puget Sound For 1st Time On Record; 3rd Tropical Species In 7 Months

Two dolphins that would be more at home frolicking in the warm bays of southern California or Mexico are cruising the chilly waters of Puget Sound and biologists are baffled by an apparent trend for tropical species to head north.

Reports of strange whistles started coming in to the Orca Network in late May followed by sightings of unidentified cetaceans reported to the Cascadia Research Collective, an Olympia marine mammal research group.

On June 4, the strangers were confirmed by Cascadia biologist Annie Douglas as long-beaked common dolphins, a species that has never previously been seen in Puget Sound. "The first photos were of a juvenile animal and the one we are seeing now is an older animal, maybe subadult," she said.

EDIT

The common dolphins are the third tropical species to turn up in Puget Sound or Juan de Fuca Strait within the last seven months. In January a bottlenose dolphin, a species that rarely goes north of central California, stranded and died near the Nisqually Delta in Puget Sound, after being seen in the area for at least a month prior to its death, and in December a Bryde's whale died after being severely injured by a ship. Another Bryde's whale stranded and died in southern Puget Sound in January 2010. Bryde's whales usually prefer tropical or warm temperate waters.

http://www.timescolonist.com/technology/Southern+dolphins+rare+visit+biologists+confusion/4999139/story.html

:shrug:

why shouldn't the animals?