Science News reports on new findings that our intelligent neighbors to the sea have finally been spotted using tools:
These dolphins dive to the bottom of deep channels and poke their sponge-covered beaks into the sandy ocean floor to flush out small fish that dwell there, says a team led by biologist Janet Mann of Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. Foragers then drop their sponges, gobble up available fish and retrieve the implements for another sweep, the scientists report online December 10 in PLoS ONE. Dolphins hold the sponge with the bottom of their beaks and can sweep away much more sand than they could otherwise.
Mann’s team documented this behavior among 41 bottlenose dolphins, most of them female, out of a population of several thousand that inhabits Australia’s Shark Bay.