EXCERPT: 'Dolphin Diaries,' a Groundbreaking Glimpse Into How Dolphins Communicate and Live

July 28, 2011 -- Dr. Denise Herzing has spent the past 25 years of her life immersed under the sea, immersed with a pod of wild spotted dolphins just off the coast of the Bahamas, to be precise. In those 25 years, Herzing has become like a member of the pod herself, forging strong ties with three generations of the playful animals that amuse us with their above-water tricks, engage us with their desire for human touch and intrigue us with their intelligence.

Her new book, "Dolphin Diaries: My 25 Years with Spotted Dolphins in the Bahamas," is like taking a voyage into an underwater aquarium with Herzing as the guide. The author, scientist and founder of the Wild Dolphin Project gives readers a firsthand account of her research and the intimate moments she witnessed and recorded her fellow pod-mates feeding, playing, fighting, mating, giving birth and struggling with environmental changes.

Most intriguingly, "Dolphin Diaries" also provides a glimpse into the dolphins' intricate language, the vocalizations, rhythmic posturing and signature whistles that captivate even onlookers far away on shore. Herzing's groundbreaking research, still underway in the Bahamas, includes interacting with the dolphins through an underwater keyboard for two-way communication, all in an effort to close the communication gap between humans and other species

"The deciphering of a nonhuman species language could be one of our greatest feats," Herzing writes. "It may yet be our best training ground for exploring the cosmos for other life, for if we can't understand and interact with life on this planet then there is no hope for our exploration of the galaxy."

Read an excerpt from "Dolphin Diaries: My 25 Years with Spotted Dolphins in the Bahamas" below, then check out other books in the "GMA" library.

Introduction

In wildness is the preservation of the world.—Henry David Thoreau, Walking, 1862

I have been privileged to work with some of the most intelligent animalson the planet— dolphins. More than two de cades ago I came tothis remote location in the northern Bahamas with hopes of finding along- term research site to observe dolphins underwater and eventuallyattempt interspecies communication with a wild pod of dolphins. As abehavioral and marine biologist, I have observed three generations ofdolphin families. This book is about that resident community of Atlanticspotted dolphins, Stenella frontalis. I have resided in their world for thelast twenty- fi ve summers, tracking the lives, deaths, and births of morethan two hundred individual spotted dolphins and two hundred bottlenosedolphins, watching them grow up, have fi ghts, develop friendships,and take on the responsibilities within their wild dolphin society.

My work is divided into three time frames based on my own pro cessof understanding and observations. Th e early years, from 1985 to 1991, Ispent fi guring out how to observe and interact with the dolphins underwater.I discovered that through a patient, perseverant, and respectfulpro cess the dolphins allowed extensive observation of their behavior andsocial interaction. Th ey let us into their lives and we became privilegedobservers of their courtship, mating, and childhood play for two de cades.Th ings took their own pace, drifting slowly into the knowledge ofanother species through observation, interaction, and exploration oftheir world. Within my work was always an awareness of the dichotomybetween leaving wild dolphins alone and interacting with them, a balanceI tried to strike while exploring this unique opportunity.During the middle years, from 1992 to 1996, the dolphins showed usextraordinary behavior and patterns. I began to see complex underwaterbehavior on a regular basis and to understand the pro cesses by which thedolphins developed these behaviors. In opposition to the fully actuated,adult, ritualized, and predictable behaviors were the "developing juvenilebehavior," which contained similar, but uncoordinated body movementsand vocalizations, not yet ritualized but varied with intensities ofmovements and sounds.

During the later years, from 1997 to 2008, I watched many individualdolphins grow up and produce a third generation. Observing andinteracting with many of the now grandmothers and elder males of thesociety was like growing up with an aquatic family. I initiated some advancedprojects with high- frequency sound recording equipment, ge netics,and cognitive studies, including social learning and teaching. In1997 I also initiated my Phase II work, developing an underwater keyboardand interactive protocol for two- way communication betweenhumans and dolphins, which led us through four fascinating years ofinterspecies communication experiments. Th en, in 2004 and 2005, thedolphin community was ripped apart and reshuffl ed from the impacts ofHurricanes Frances, Jeanne, and Wilma.

It is my goal to illuminate the lives of these individual dolphins toyou through their triumphs, their failures, their development, and interactionwith their environment. Th ese stories will, of course, be throughmy eyes, which, although trained, will still be limited to a human perspective.Yet we need to bear witness to the truths of the natural worldas best as we can. Th e impact and passage of time only deepens and enrichesthe trust and quality of sharing during repeated encounters withthe dolphins, a pro cess that anthropologists know well. Of course wedirectly and inadvertently aff ect the pro cess of our own research. In mycase I was in the water, observing intimate details of the dolphins' life,and interacting with these individuals as another species. I describe thepro cess of establishing my research project, getting to know the dolphins,their personalities, and their patterns of behavior. I have tried toshare my thoughts and feelings as well as my own triumphs and failuressince they were vital learning experiences.

Now their community has shifted and changed, and although it mayonce again reach some equilibrium after nature's fury, it will undoubtedlybe diff erent. How would we know how life has changed without thoseobservations from the last two de cades? We simply would not. Th is is thereal value of long- term research.

Dolphins are like icebergs— what you see on the surface is only asmall part of the activity underneath. Th ere are stories of the individualdolphins that make up this group. Th ere are stories of their families andtheir encounters with sharks. Th ere are stories of my encounters withsharks. Th ere are stories of fi rst arriving in the Bahamas and the years ittook to win the dolphins' trust. Th ere are stories of data gathering, stormchasing, and people dynamics. Th ere are also stories of juvenile dolphinsthat grew up in front of my eyes. Some had calves of their own and wenton to become productive members of their society. Others struggled anddied in the wild. Over the years we documented their range, their movement,and the habitats in which the dolphins spend time. I have seendolphins hunting on the shallow sandbanks during the day and off thedeep edge of the sandbank where fi sh and squid amass at night. I havewatched the fascinating and complex relationship between the spotteddolphins and resident bottlenose dolphins, which entails foraging, aggression,and interspecies babysitting.

Dolphins live in a complex society with friends and relatives: they eatand hunt, raise young, share responsibilities, avoid predators, and resolveconfl icts. Th ey also live in a sensory world we can only imagine, full ofdiff erent sounds, sights, and tastes, and a world we may never entirelyunderstand. What we can share with dolphins is their family lives, theirdaily challenges, and their fierce devotion to their off spring and community.It is here where the boundaries between humans and dolphinsintersect and it is here where we must look for hope in their culturalpreservation, as we hope for our own.

I use the technique of "anthropomorphizing" to describe what thedolphins do in the wild and the closest human analogies possible. In thisbook I tell the stories and share observations of my dolphin work thatare diffi cult to include in scientific papers.* In some instances I have usedthe tool of anthropomorphizing and ascribing emotions to the dolphins,as justifi ed in Charles Darwin's Emotions of Animals and Marc Bekoff 'srecent book Th e Emotional Lives of Animals. Both make the argument foremotional continuity in other species and its scientifi c support. As DonaldGriffi n said in Th e Question of Animal Awareness, a groundbreaking bookfrom the 1990s, "anthropomorphizing is a tool for us to think about whatmight be going on."

I also discuss my thoughts about dolphins in captivity and the ethicsof the dolphin trade. As Al Gore labeled his fi lm about climate changeAn Incon ve nient Truth, captive dolphin issues are also somewhat of anincon ve nient truth. It is incon ve nient because it challenges both thehuman assumption of uniqueness and the lucrative fi nancial business ofcapturing wild dolphins for swim programs and human- assisted therapy.I know of very few dolphin- loving humans who would condone theseprograms if they knew that their child was swimming with one of itsvictims. If I could, I would apologize to the dolphins for this behavior byrepresentatives of the human race.

Humans have the most complex brains on the planet, and even beyondthe great apes are dolphins, with the second- most evolved brain.Yet dolphins have no hands to manipulate objects or build things; thequalities we often subscribe to advanced intelligence. Can we put ourimagination and creativity, our best science and technical advances intoaction to understand another species? Th is would be a diff erent challengethan we've ever undertaken before, perhaps not all technical butempathic, scientifi c but participatory, and interactive instead of invasive.

The goal of Phase II, interspecies communication, was to attempt to closethe gap, to build a bridge of understanding. Like a migratory species Ireturned every summer to the shallow sandbank of the Bahamas, as Ihave for the past twenty- fi ve years, still asking that big question: Whatare they doing with all that complex brainpower in the vast ocean?

What my work in the fi eld has taught me is that dolphins are intelligentbeings with complex lives, relationships, and communication. In thewild we have a chance to observe how their cognitive and communicativeskills are put to use in the survival game of the real world. It is theclosest we can get to living in an alien culture and to gain insight in thepro cess of engaging another species. I am grateful for eager young graduatestudents who will carry the torch a while longer. Even then we willhave only glimpsed the tip of the iceberg.

It is with great plea sure that I now take you under the water with me,although you'll be able to stay dry and free of jellyfi sh stings and saltyhair. Or maybe you won't. Perhaps you'll feel the force of the winds asthey kick up the gin- clear seas. Possibly you'll imagine what it must feellike to have an annoying little remora sliding around your body or a largeshark follow you back to the boat. It's up to you. Let me take you thereto the Bahamas and underwater with the incredible community of wilddolphins I have known for twenty- fi ve years. It would be my privilege.

* For technical and scientific papers see www.wilddolphinproject.org library or the selectedreading list at the end of the book. Also, http://home.earthlink.net/~dolphindiaries.