By working together, dolphins and net-casting fishers in Brazil each catch more fish, a rare example of an interaction by two top predators that is beneficial to both parties, researchers have concluded following 15 years of study of the practice.
By working together, dolphins and net-casting fishers in Brazil each catch more fish, a rare example of an interaction by two top predators that is beneficial to both parties, researchers have concluded following 15 years of study of the practice.
“We knew that the fishers were observing the dolphins’ behavior to determine when to cast their nets, but we didn’t know if the dolphins were actively coordinating their behavior with the fishers,” said Mauricio Cantor of Oregon State University’s Marine Mammal Institute, who led the study.
“Using drones and underwater imaging, we could observe the behaviors of fishers and dolphins with unprecedented detail and found that they catch more fish by working in synchrony,” said Cantor, an assistant professor in OSU’s College of Agricultural Sciences. “This shows that this is a mutually beneficial interaction between the humans and the dolphins.”
Read more at: Oregon State University
A dolphin giving a cue to a fisher at Praia da Tesoura in Laguna, Brazil. (Photo Credit Dr. Bianca Romeu, Departamento de Ecologia e Zoologia, Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina; Florianópolis, SC 88040-900, Brazil)
