Study: Wild Dolphins Are Totally Stuck Up

Still angry about how the jocks shunning you throughout high school? Well, now you know what a wild bottlenose dolphin feels like. For that first time in any other species, scientists have found that the dolphin form cliques based on their skills. The study found that the dolphin engaged in “inclusive inheritability” bonding after observing dolphins in Shark Bay, Australia.

The discovery was the result of an effort to learn more about the use of sponges to protect the noses of some dolphins. Researchers then discovered that the use of such tools was not passed along to the whole population. The followed a dolphin named “Sponging Eve” — not a great nickname for one of the “cool” girls to be sure. However, Sponging Eve would use a sponge to protect her nose in rough sand.

They found that “Spongers were more cliquish” — isn’t that always the case among humans?

The scientists learned that “like humans who preferentially associate with others who share their subculture, tool-using dolphins prefer others like themselves, strongly suggesting that sponge tool-use is a cultural behaviour.”

They are still looking for evidence that the spongers would exclude others at the mall.

Source: Telegraph

8 thoughts on “Study: Wild Dolphins Are Totally Stuck Up”

  1. The dolphins used to swim along side the Navy ship I was on. You could see them jumping.

  2. As no one has done it yet, the obligatory Seinfeld reference:

    So does “sponging eve” spend her time deciding who is spongeworthy?

  3. The Dogalogue Machine that this dog barks into is provided by a guy here at the marina named Stanley who has another DolphinGuy Machine which he uses to talk to dolphins. He developed this with some agency called the NSA. We can not talk to the dolphins yet but that is supposedly next on the agenda. The dolphins are little snitches that go out into the harbor and report back the size of the boats coming into the channel. Sometimes our dog snarls dont translate well into humanoid American lingo but the dog biscuits keep coming our way as we bark and growl about the behavior of the folks out int he neighborhoods.
    TalkinDog sittin in for BarkinDog.

  4. The dolphins are happy not to be on land right now, because over half of the counties in the U.S.eh? have been declared disaster areas due to weather:

    That brings this year’s total to 1,584 in 32 states, more than 90 percent of them because of the drought.

    (HuffPo).

  5. This make complete sense from an evolutionary stand point. You group with others who appear to have special skills like yours and you increase the chances of your offspring having special skills thereby increasing your genetic odds of survival.

    2 pop culture jibs:
    As long as they don’t get friggin lasers on their heads!
    Like Elaine, Eve is looking for males that are “sponge worthy”

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