Behavior of a striped dolphins

Behavior

The Striped Dolphin is the only species that takes part in roto-tailing. This is the process of leaping very high out of the water. While it is out of the water, they rapidly rotate the tail while in midair. The jumps can be up to 20 feet in the air! This particular dolphin is extremely active, and they are known to take part in a variety of maneuvers. They may bow ride, breach, and they are quite vocal. They make a variety of whistling and clicking sounds to communicate with each other. All dolphins do this, but the Striped Dolphins seem to engage in it much more.

The size of a pod of Striped Dolphins can range from just a handful to more than 1,000. They do have larger pods though than most dolphins. The average is from 100 to 500 members. There are plenty of types of schools though for them including those with juveniles, those with breeding adults, as well as those that include non-breeding adults. With such distinctions the dolphins will move around to various pods at different times in their lives.

For example, calves usually move to the juvenile school when they are a couple years of age, after weaning. Juveniles may move to the non-breeding adults before they actually transition to the breeding school. What is interesting is that the numbers tend to remain very equal between the non-breeding and breeding schools. The complexities of these movements in the various schools may contribute to why more communication takes place.

Feeding

They will take the various opportunities that come along in their environment for eating. They tend to consume large amounts of bony fish, crustaceans, and cephalopods. The types of food they dine on though will vary based on the region they live in. They tend to look for food around the continental slope where the ocean floor has a steep element to it. They can dive up to 2,300 feet to get food.

(source:google/http://www.dolphins-world.com/)