dc.contributor.author | Finn, J | |
dc.contributor.author | Tregenza, T | |
dc.contributor.author | Norman, M | |
dc.date.accessioned | 2017-02-22T12:02:37Z | |
dc.date.issued | 2009-01-21 | |
dc.description.abstract | Dolphins are well known for their complex social and foraging behaviours. Direct underwater observations of wild dolphin feeding behaviour however are rare. At mass spawning aggregations of giant cuttlefish (Sepia apama) in the Upper Spencer Gulf in South Australia, a wild female Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops aduncus) was observed and recorded repeatedly catching, killing and preparing cuttlefish for consumption using a specific and ordered sequence of behaviours. Cuttlefish were herded to a sand substrate, pinned to the seafloor, killed by downward thrust, raised mid-water and beaten by the dolphin with its snout until the ink was released and drained. The deceased cuttlefish was then returned to the seafloor, inverted and forced along the sand substrate in order to strip the thin dorsal layer of skin off the mantle, thus releasing the buoyant calcareous cuttlebone. This stepped behavioural sequence significantly improves prey quality through 1) removal of the ink (with constituent melanin and tyrosine), and 2) the calcareous cuttlebone. Observations of foraging dolphin pods from above-water at this site (including the surfacing of intact clean cuttlebones) suggest that some or all of this prey handling sequence may be used widely by dolphins in the region. Aspects of the unique mass spawning aggregations of giant cuttlefish in this region of South Australia may have contributed to the evolution of this behaviour through both high abundances of spawning and weakened post-spawning cuttlefish in a small area (>10,000 animals on several kilometres of narrow rocky reef), as well as potential long-term and regular visitation by dolphin pods to this site. | en_GB |
dc.description.sponsorship | The authors wish to thank Tokyo Broadcasting System - Live Inc., Tony Bramley of Whyalla Diving Services, Graham Ross and Alpha Diving Products for
assistance with this project. JF and MN wish to thank the following bodies for research funding support: Hermon Slade Foundation, Australian Biological
Resources Study and the Australian Research Council. TT was funded by a Royal Society Fellowship. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and
analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. | en_GB |
dc.identifier.citation | Vol. 4, article e4217 | en_GB |
dc.identifier.doi | 10.1371/journal.pone.0004217 | |
dc.identifier.uri | http://hdl.handle.net/10871/26007 | |
dc.language.iso | en | en_GB |
dc.publisher | Public Library of Science | en_GB |
dc.relation.url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19156212 | en_GB |
dc.rights | © 2009 Finn et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted
use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. | en_GB |
dc.title | Preparing the perfect cuttlefish meal: complex prey handling by dolphins | en_GB |
dc.type | Article | en_GB |
dc.date.available | 2017-02-22T12:02:37Z | |
dc.identifier.issn | 1932-6203 | |
exeter.place-of-publication | United States | en_GB |
dc.description | This is the final version of the article. Available from the publisher via the DOI in this record. | en_GB |
dc.identifier.journal | PLoS One | en_GB |