Dolphins Blow Bubble Air Rings

When you spend your life in the water, I guess you tend to develop a good intuition for its subtleties. Dolphins have been observed to create bubble rings by exhaling air carefully in the middle of the vortices caused by the motion of their fins through the water, among other techniques.

Besides being nice to look at (and a neat demonstration of fluid mechanics), this phenomenon also might throw some light on dolphin cognition, since the skill to create the rings is a bit subtle and tends to be taught from one dolphin to the next via careful observation and practice. I'm also intrigued by the report that they seem to be using sonar to locate the vortex in the water, since that would be a fairly amazing bit of audio analysis.

This was filmed and edited by chiajungchi, who also has a YouTube site. Thanks for allowing me to post it as well, chiajungchi!

Category:

Pets & Animals

Tags:

• dolphin
• aquatic

[BigPoppaFury]

Makes you wonder huh...."so long, and thanks for all the fish" ;)

[timetogetfoxy]

I'm currently wishing I was a dolphin.

[gottatakeapiss5]

Wow we have some amazing animals!! They are so smart!

[MissCharlotte75]

Can someone confirm that the music is from the Candyman song?

[NatalieexBaybeeOx]

@BigPoppaFury Straight after this video the dolphins started singing, then leapt out into space..

[Haleyology]

i think this is very cool

[jerkyboi916]

Wow Thats Amazing

[inevergiveup1402]

@thewulfone

Yes, it's very light like in the air , it really is

[thewulfone]

@inevergiveup1402 Yes it does. It looks like they flying and not swimming, except for the bubbles. 

[inevergiveup1402]

@thewulfone

Aerial i meant

[inevergiveup1402]

@thewulfone

LOL, it looks very aerieal , in spite of the fact that it is in the water =))