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Swimming with dolphins

10,000 Birds

Even people with no other interest in wildlife, who couldn’t tell a sparrow from an ostrich (or even a dolphin from a fish) love dolphins. Dolphins are basically just smart sharks that breath air. Now don’t get me wrong, I like dolphins. And dolphins can do bad things.

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Offshore Sea Life ID Guide: West Coast–A Book Review

10,000 Birds

Offshore Sea Life ID Guide: West Coast is designed to be a quick, handy resource for use on whale watching and one-day pelagic trips. Tail, fin, blow, and back for whales; fin, back, leaping whole body, and tail splashes for dolphins and porpoises. We saw two Blue Whales on our trip, quickly identified by the boat’s crew.

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An Amazing Boat Ride from Santa Cruz Island to Ventura Harbor

10,000 Birds

It took me awhile, but I managed to get on quite a few, especially when the boat slowed down to go check out some Humpback Whales and a huge number of Common Dolphins. Sooty Shearwaters and a Western Gull fly back the aftermath of a Humpback Whale breaching. We estimated at least 3,500 sooties and over 1,000 dolphins.

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GalĂ¡pagos: A Natural History, Second Edition–A Book Review

10,000 Birds

GalĂ¡pagos: A Natural History, Second Edition by John Kricher and Kevin Loughlin gives the traveling naturalist the tools needed to fully appreciate and experience the GalĂ¡pagos Islands. I wish I had read this book. They complement Kricher’s text., The 11th chapter is on research and conservation challenges.

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To the Gulf Stream Once Again

10,000 Birds

Perhaps the best experience of the two days I spend offshore was not a bird, but a mammal. As it was when a small pod of Gervais’ Beaked Whales, small whales that look like bulked up Bottlenosed Dolphins tolerated our approach and allowed us to have a surreal experience with this mysterious marine mammal.

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Offshore Sea Life: East Coast, Birds of Pennsylvania, & Texas Birds: Three Books, Three Reviews

10,000 Birds

A little longer than its predecessor (by eight pages to be exact), the East Coast guide is your handy dandy, pocket-sized, all-in-one guide to the seabirds, marine mammals, sea turtles, fish, and other creatures you are likely to encounter on pelagics or whale watching trips, from Bar Harbor, Maine to Ponce de Leon Inlet, Florida.

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The Ross Sea – the Last Intact Marine Ecosystem on Earth – and I

10,000 Birds

The Ross Sea is the most productive stretch of water in the Southern Ocean, teeming with large predatory fish, whales, seals, penguins and other animals that form the last intact marine ecosystem on Earth. Sperm Whales prey on Toothfish and large squid and in February 2007, a 10-metre (32.8 Enough History – Back to the Future.

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