Signing off... wait before you do that... stick a Steno!

Yet again the weather stunk today, but we decided to pull into the lee of Kauai and trawl for dolphins. We struck success with a large group of rough-toothed dolphins. These guys are usually disinterested in riding the bow wave, but to our surprise we had ample opportunity to do some biopsy sampling from the bow. Miraculously, we doubled our sample collection numbers for this leg in about 2 hours (up to a whopping total of 6).

Here is the overall summery for sightings added to my personal "life list":

Longman's beaked Whale - Indopacetus pacificus
Bryde's whale - Balaenotpera edeni
Sei whale - Balaenoptera borealis
Rough-toothed dolphin - Steno bredanensis**
Gray's spinner dolphin - Stenella longirostris longirostris
Short-finned pilot whales - Globicephala macrorhynchus**
Fraser's dolphin - Lagenodelphis hosei
False killer whale - Pseudorca crassidens

That's 8 new species including the very rare Longman's beaked whale, and two first timers made the biopsy list**!!!

OK folks - thanks for keeping up with the Okie, and for giving me some good comments and questions along the way. If you have enjoyed, please feel free to post it or email to let me know. After tonight's post, I'm on shore leave with a beautiful brunette for a week, and then I'm head back to the alternative lifestyle of a graduate student thereafter. Thanks again for logging on!

Until next time, be sure to cork your irons and coil your lines!!

Signing-off,

Okie Whaler
photo courtesy of Jim Cotton