abs-cbnNEWS.com 10 Feb 09;
A large pack of at least 300 dolphins were sighted swimming slowly in the shallow waters of Bataan on Tuesday morning, an "unusual, strange" phenomenon as described by the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR).
BFAR chief Malcolm Sarmiento said the 200 to 300 dolphins are swimming slowly between the waters of Orion and Pilar town in Bataan province. He said the dolphins were only at least one kilometer away from the beach of the two towns.
“We will try to determine the actual reason for the phenomenon. It is something unusual. It is the first time that such a large pack [of dolphins] entered Manila Bay, and it’s acting strangely,” Sarmiento told ANC’s Dateline Philippines on Tuesday noon.
Sarmiento, who was on his way to the site, said BFAR experts are looking at two possible reasons why the dolphins found their way in the shallow waters of Bataan.
He said the dolphins could have been caught by a strong seaquake while diving for food underwater.
He explained that a strong seaquake can damage the dolphins’ eardrums.
“Once their eardrums are injured, they would lose their sense of direction and they would become disoriented,” he said, adding that the BFAR and experts from the Ocean Adventure in Manila would have to move faster to save the mammals from growing weak due to starvation.
“They cannot dive for food anymore resulting in a situation where they become weak with hunger and they just with the current,” the BFAR chief explained.
Another possibility, he said, is that the pack has a sick leader.
He said there is a possibility of mass beaching if the supposed sick leader is not isolated from the pack.
“If the leader would beach itself, the healthy dolphins will follow him,” Sarmiento said.
He said that while he was on his way to the site, he is in contact with experts from the Ocean Adventure and the local government unit.
Sarmiento said they would have to come up with a strategy on how to isolate the leader from the healthy dolphins.
He said he had also asked the local government in Bataan to secure the site and keep off fishermen who might see an opportunity of the unusual phenomenon.
Sarmiento said as soon as he gets to the site, he will instruct BFAR divers to look for the pack’s leader.
He said the pack’s leader is usually the “oldest” and is “battle scarred.” He added that the leader usually swims at the end of the pack.
'Hundreds' of dolphins beached in Philippines
AFP 10 Feb 09;
MANILA (AFP) — More than 200 dolphins have beached themselves on Manila Bay, officials in the Philippines said Tuesday as they tried to work out why the marine mammals had come ashore.
Residents saw huge pods of dolphins near the towns of Pilar and Abucay on the Bataan peninsula west of Manila.
Bataan governor Enrique Garcia said at least three have died.
"This is an unusual phenomenon," Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources director Malcolm Sarmiento told local radio, estimating the number of dolphins at "more than 200."
He said they could be reacting to a "heat wave or disturbance at sea" such as a possible major underwater earthquake.
Since they are mammals, the dolphins have ears that are sensitive to large changes in pressure underwater, he said.
"If their eardrums are damaged they become disorientated and they float up to the surface," he added.
Sarmiento said authorities' first concern was to keep the dolphins alive, and experts are being summoned to the area to help.
He said smaller pods of dolphins numbering "in the tens and twenties" had beached themselves elsewhere in the Philippines previously, but this was the first time so many had done so at the same time and place.