Bottlenose dolphins love to play!

Bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) are one of our most charismatic animals. We relate to them because of their family groups, intelligence, and playful disposition. While I was working at the Brookfield Zoo, I developed a behavioral monitoring program matched with saliva collection to study the relationship between behavioral categories (play, aggression, resting, human-interaction) and secretory immunoglobulin-A. We used this information to learn more about how dolphins perceive their environment so we could ensure the best animal welfare practices. Dolphins living at the Brookfield Zoo are studied to learn more about wild dolphins, particularly through a collaboration with the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program.