My fascination with dolphins, especially the bottlenose dolphin, started while I was stationed in North Carolina where my unit practiced rubber boat landings along the coast. The exercise consisted of paddling out approximately one mile in an inflatable boat with a seven-man team, capsizing the boat, and swimming away from it. At that point, we were to swim back, right the boat, and begin the exercise over.

     One day while the boat was capsized, we started swimming for it, but we were unable to catch up to it. The harder we swam, the farther away the boat moved. The secret to the power of the boat was revealed to us when several bottlenose dolphins popped up from underneath. Apparently, they decided to participate in our exercise in a negative way by pushing the boat away from us, causing us to swim even faster and harder to catch up to the vessel. This was my first experience with a “human dolphin swim encounter”.

     After my military tour, I acquired a job at one of the first aquariums in the country, called Aquarama, in Philadelphia. One of my tasks was to maintain filtration and see that the show pool was clean of debris, and the underwater viewing windows clear. This job was performed at night when the aquarium was empty. The first two or three times down with scuba gear, cleaning was quite boring – until the unexpected visitors arrived in the main show pool.

     After becoming mesmerized by pushing the underwater vacuum around the bottom of the pool, I felt the presence of eyes watching me. I looked around. To my surprise, behind me in the pool were three bottlenose dolphins (the residents of this enclosure during show hours). It surprised me because these animals were normally kept in holding pens separated from the show pool by underwater gates.

     The animals immediately started to assist in my cleaning tasks. One started pushing the vacuum across the bottom. At one point, the large bull that was in charge of the pool slowly rose to the surface where a sleeping pelican was floating, and to the surprise of the pelican (that left the pool in quite a hurry) the dolphin removed one of the tail feathers and brought it to me. This became a nightly occurrence, much to my delight.

     When the trainers were told about this episode, they refused to believe it, because every morning when they came to work the animals were in their respective holding facilities. The mystery was solved by watching the dolphins throughout their play session at night. I observed them heading back into their holding facility. The last animal in the enclosure would simply catch the open gate with its tail fluke, pulling it closed and throwing the latch over the securing bar. This exercise was not conducted by just one animal; each and every dolphin knew the closing procedure. As my duties grew over the years to performing and training these dolphins, I became even more aware of the high level of intelligence these beings possess.

     Since then, my role with marine mammals has been a bit different. Rather than working with performing captive animals, my wife Sheila and I decided to assist those individuals that wash ashore unexpectedly along our coast line.

     The rehabilitation of these protected species is not only for the well being of the individual animal, although that is foremost in our attempts, but to gain more of an insight to their behavior and to collect valuable scientific data on their future.

     I have worked on many various types of marine mammals and sea turtles through the years and there is nothing more rewarding than the pleasure of releasing these animals after recovery. However, a low point in our stranding career took place in 1987 when bottlenose dolphins started washing ashore en masse along the NJ coast in abnormally large numbers, ultimately to reach 90 animals in this state alone. Then, the epidemic started spreading south to the Florida coast with over 740 confirmed deaths, and many more animals that died at sea that were never accounted for.

     During that summer, I was able to rescue only one live dolphin and place it in our holding pool. That animal died three minutes after being placed in the facility. This die-off made me recall years ago the helplessness I felt when I worked with captive dolphins and how I could go home at night to a change of scenery, knowing that the dolphins had no choice but to look at four concrete walls around them.

Click here to read an article about the blind seal on the ASPCA web site. Now They Both Have Homes By Brand Biehl, Field Stranding Technician As of 9/28/07 it is official, both non-releasable seals have found a home!!  MMSC-07-024, our blind adult male harbor seal, is officially going to Los Angeles Zoo. The seal came in on 3/3/07 in Cape May Point and quickly became a media darling when his chances of ever finding placement looked grim. After lots of searching, however, the L.A zoo showed promising interest, and they have now confirmed that they have a home for him!  When the seal stranded, the staff was amazed that, besides the obvious blindness which caused him to not be able to find and catch food, there was no other medical problems.  He quickly captured our hearts, but we knew that finding a home for a wild adult seal was hard enough even without the blindness.  Nevertheless, he continued to prove that he wanted a chance with his eagerness to learn his way around our facility’s pool and ever-growing courage to trust us. He currently is beginning the first steps of training by targeting on our hand and other objects. He is going to make a great addition to the zoo. Like the blind harbor seal, a juvenile grey seal also tugged on our heart strings when she came in on 4/16/07.  Beach goers had called to report that she had hit a jetty in Asbury Park.  Lethargic and underweight, we took her in and were hopeful that she would make a full recovery.  However, it soon became obvious that she was limited in her ability to move her rear flippers.  After extensive x-rays, we found that she had an old fracture on her spine that had fused improperly.  This fracture caused her limited feeling and mobility in her rear flippers, and it forced her to swim using only her front flippers.  Without the quick bursts of speed produced by kicking rear flippers, it is believed she was unable to avoid the jetty, and she was probably limited on her ability to catch fish.  Once again, we searched for a home for a non-releasable seal.  However, with her youth and her always obvious like for humans on her side, Indianapolis Zoo quickly agreed on August 29, 2007 to accept her into their facility. She was taken to her new home on October 6th, 2007 and is doing great! We at the Marine Mammal Stranding Center will miss the companionship that these two seals have brought into our lives.  Although our greatest joy is to watch rehabilitated/ healthy seals be released into the wild, with no attachment to humans, these two seals have been quite the honored guests.  We will miss them, but we are thrilled that they have found their home and place in this world for what we hope is many years to come.  Thank you Indianapolis Zoo and L.A. Zoo for opening your facility and your hearts!  Thank you to MMSC-07-024 and MMSC-07-050 for sharing a part of your journey with us and filling us with joy! (Please see photos in our strandings section.)

The Press of Atlantic City

Stranding Center, Indianapolis Zoo seal deal By BRIAN IANIERI Staff Writer, (609) 463-6713 A gray seal pup that washed ashore with a broken back on New Jersey's coast earlier this year and was rehabilitated at the Marine Mammal Stranding Center in Brigantine has found a home. The seal, which due to its injuries requires special attention, will be taken by the Indianapolis Zoo, Bob Schoelkopf, the center's director, said Wednesday. Meanwhile, officials are still searching for a place for another seal. The 200-pound harbor seal, which was rescued from a Cape May Point Beach in February, is blind and cannot be released into the wild Officials have found no takers yet for the blind seal, but Schoelkopf said Wednesday a San Diego hotel chain that has a seal tank has asked about it. "We're keeping our fingers crossed," he said. A representative of the hotel did not return a phone call Wednesday. Finding permanent places for these types of seals may become more difficult in the future. They can't survive in the ocean if released, but they're not sick either. And the types of facilities equipped to house a seal are extremely limited. "The problem is a lot of these zoos now are breeding their own, and when they breed in captivity, they have no need to take injured ones from the wild," Schoelkopf said. The gray female seal pup, which has paralysis in its hind quarters, will be driven to the Indianapolis Zoo, he said. This will involve a pickup truck with a cap over the bed, a bed of ice and air conditioner cranked up, he said. Teri Frady is spokeswoman for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Northeast Fisheries Science Center, which is involved in finding facilities for seals unable to return to the wild. Using records from 2000 on, Frady said no healthy but "special needs" seal has been euthanized because there was nowhere for it to go, a record of 80-0. That could change in the future, she said. "I'm sure the day will come when we'll have to make a decision for that," she said.