Bottlenose Dolphin

Tursiops truncatus

On the field trip I spotted a bottlenose dolphin.  This species live in seas, bays, estuaries, oceans, on the coast, and on banks.  These dolphins have a chunky head, a gray back and a white belly.  They use counter shading.  Bottlenose dolphins are playful and highly intelligent.  Their domain is Eukarya, the kingdom is Animalia, the phylum is Chordata, the class is Mammalia, the order is Cetacea, the family is Delphinidae, the genus is Tursiops, and the species is Truncatus.  Bottlenose dolphins have bilateral symmetry.  That means that you can fold them into 2 equal halves.  They are heterotrophs and are endothermic.  Meaning they eat other organisms and are warm blooded.  A functional adaptation is they are fast swimmers.  A behavioral adaptation is dolphins play with other dolphins in packs and hunt in packs.  Bottlenose dolphins have developed fishing relationships with other fishermen in Argentina!  The predators of these creatures are humans and plastic.  Dolphins usually feed on fish.   I got this picture from roadsendnauturalist.com