New Dolphin Species Discoverer Honored

An Australian student has won a prestigious award at an international conference for her discovery of a new species of dolphin.

Kate Charlton-Robb, who works in partnership with the peninsula’s Dolphin Research Institute, received the John G. Shedd Aquarium Award at a Society of Marine Mammalogy event in Quebec, Canada.

The Monash Ph.D. student, who has been studying the genetics of Victoria’s dolphins for the past few years, presented a paper on her discovery that the dolphins in Port Phillip Bay are “genetically isolated” so are a whole new species.

More than 1500 delegates from across the world attended the Quebec conference and Charlton-Robb said she was thrilled to receive recognition at such an event.

“The unique pod of about 50 dolphins lives in the Gippsland Lakes system year-round, happily accommodating local fluctuations between salt and fresh water. So they’re very special.

Charlton-Robb says the species is genetically different from the two known bottlenose dolphin species, but has physical characteristics of both the common bottlenose and the Indo-specific dolphins.

“Our Victoria’s East dolphins are about 2 ½ metres in length – about half a metre shorter than the common bottlenose. Their colour is much more graduated too. It goes from grey on their backs to mid-grey to white on their bellies. In the common bottlenose, found offshore in Victorian waters, the change in colour is much more pronounced.

“Unlike their common bottlenose cousins, this East Gippsland species also calves all year round”, says Charlton-Robb.

“These dolphins travel in tight nursery pods. So you might see up to about 30 dolphins together, ranging from newborn calves to adult.

“They reside in the estuarine East Gippsland lakes system, and can be found anywhere between Lake Wellington and Lakes Entrance”, she says.

Loren Coleman About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct). Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015. Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.

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