Marine mammals are fascinating creatures. As a child, I dreamed of becoming a dolphin trainer.Ā Isn’t that every child’s dream? I was lucky enough to experience hands on training with marine animals through internships in Australia and the southern United States. What a dream come true!
Training marine mammals was an opportunity for me to teach others about the ocean and the creatures living in it.
“In the end we will conserve only what we love; we will love only what we understand; and we will understand only what we are taught.”Ā (Baba Dioum, 1968.)
Whales
Did you know that marine mammals give birth to live young, produce milk and have hair? These three little details…make a mammal a ‘mammal’.
Whales are the most facinating creatures! The blue whale is the largest animal on earth and magestic in all it’s mighty. Did you know know that a Blue Whale can be as long as ‘three school busses’ and weigh as much as ‘300,000 lbs’? The Blue Whale is currently on the endangered species list.
This picture was taken from a birds eye view. When I vistedĀ Hawaii, I noticed that photographers would wait for hours for the perfect photo of a whale breach. A breach is when the whale jumps into the air and lands on it’s side. It is known as a form of communication along with echolocation. Echolocation creates a sound wave and when it reaches an object animals can tell how far away an object is and how big the object is.
Dolphins
Dolphins are extremely intellegent creatures! The dolphin pictured above recovered from an injury with the support of a marine mammal center.
Click here for a guide about dolphins that was created by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF). It is a great resource to use in the classroom to teach about dolphins.
Two species of dolphins that inhabit rivers are the Amazon River and Ganges River dolphins. While the Atlantic Bottle Nose dolphin is found in the Atlantic Ocean.
Manatees
A creature found near the coastlines and within salt marshes is the manatee. Manatees are playful and often found eating marsh grasses (cordgrass) in the southeastern and southern coastal estuaries of the United States. What is an estuary you may be wondering? An estuary is a nursery grown for a lot of marine animals and are located where the salt water of the ocean meets the rivers.
Orca Whales
Did you know that Orcas or Killer Whales are actually dolphins? In the wild they can swim up to 40 miles a day and dive 500 feet down into the depths of the ocean. They eat sea lions, seals, birds and fish and have teeth that can get up to 4 inches long!
Sea Lions
If you heard ‘barking’ on the beach you may have heard a sea lion.Ā Sea lions communicate with a loud ‘barking’ noise. Pier 39 in San Fransisco California is known for it’s many sea lion visitors that rest daily on the pier.
Seals
Seals are known as “the dogs of the sea” because of their curious and playful personality traits. They are pinniped’s which in Latin means “fin-footed”.
