Saturday, March 24, 2012

Dolphins and Wales

The title above does not refer to two noble creatures: it is about one noble creature, and the people of Wales.
It seems that dolphins who inhabit Cardigan Bay - off the coast of Wales - have developed a peculiar entonation, according to this from BBC NEWS:

"Ronan Hickey analysed 1,882 whistles for his masters degree in marine mammal science at University of Wales, Bangor . . . Bottlenose dolphins are talking to each other using a dialect that could be unique to Wales, claim scientists.
The whistles of dolphins in Cardigan Bay are different to those living off the Irish coast, a study has found."

Unfortunately Mr. Hickey did not return any of my calls for some follow up (I sent him a link to this Blog, isn't that enough?).

So I decided to seek commentary from another expert.



It makes me wonder if dolphins are able to develop that ever so annoying accent from Rio de Janeiro.

2 comments:

  1. Really interesting!

    And I hope to god that a Rio sotaque is impossible for them to imitate.

    Thanks for the linkup!

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  2. I doubt these lovely creatures would carry such an accent: dolphins are one of the few species, other than humans, suspected to have developed empathy (not kidding).

    http://www.nytimes.com/1995/05/09/science/scientists-mull-role-of-empathy-in-man-and-beast.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm

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