Skip to content
All articles
  • All articles
  • About whales & dolphins
  • Create healthy seas
  • End captivity
  • Green Whale
  • Prevent deaths in nets
  • Scottish Dolphin Centre
  • Stop whaling
Orca Lulu's body contained PCB levels 100x above the safe limit. Image: SMASS

Toxic tides, troubled whales: the toll of chemical pollution

In last week's blog, we examined the challenges whales and dolphins face as they travel...
Group of orcas at surface

Breaking barriers for whales and dolphins at the Convention of Migratory Species

Many species of whales, dolphins and porpoises undertake long journeys, encountering human-made obstacles along the...
Tokyo

WDC in Japan – Part 1: Finding allies in Tokyo

At the end of May, I embarked on an incredible journey to Japan on behalf...
Amazon river dolphins leaping

The state of river dolphin conservation

At Whale and Dolphin Conservation, we partner with conservationists and communities fighting to save river...
Researchers in Southeast Alaska studying whale poo

We’re funding crucial research on whale poo to combat the climate crisis

The ocean is one of the lungs of our planet, and whales help it to...
Narwhal surfacing

The unicorns of the sea must be protected – CITES

The narwhal, is under threat. Often referred to as the unicorns of the sea, narwhals,...
Sperm whales

We’re pushing governments for action for our climate heroes – whales

The climate crisis is the greatest threat to all life on Earth. But there is...
Dolphins captured for captivity in Taiji. Image: Hans Peter Roth

Loved and killed – whales and dolphins in Japan

Protests and criticism from outside Japan in response to the slaughter of whales and dolphins...

Meet the brainiacs of the underwater world – deep thinkers with intricate emotional lives

Whales and dolphins have big brains, and large brained beings have a few things in common. We live long lives, we’re sociable and our behaviour is complex. Females give birth to just a few children and take extraordinary care of each baby, teaching them life skills and helping them to become independent.

Whales and dolphins behave in ways that demonstrate intelligence and a sophisticated mind. As well as learning as individuals, they pass their knowledge on to others.

© V. Mignon

Your donation will help us keep these remarkable beings safe from the many human threats they face

Like us, whales and dolphins have special cells in their brains called spindle neurons. These are associated with advanced abilities such as recognising, remembering, communicating, perceiving, adapting to change, problem-solving and understanding. So it seems that whales and dolphins are deep thinkers.

Not only that but the part of the whale and dolphin brain that processes emotions may be even more complex than our own – their social lives are intricate, requiring lots of skill to successfully manage relationships.

dolphin group V Mignon

Neuroscientist Lori Marino put it well when she said that ‘a dolphin alone is not really a dolphin; being a dolphin means being embedded in a complex social network – even more so than with humans.’ For species like orcas and bottlenose dolphins, family and community are everything. The emotional connections that tie them to one another are of a complexity that we can’t even imagine.

If people understood what intelligent and emotional beings whales and dolphins are, and realised that they are bonded together in ways that we can only try to understand, surely we’d stop killing them or confining them to tanks for our own amusement.

Did you know?

Whale and dolphin brain development graphic

The dolphin brain

Researchers in the US have used a new brain imaging technique to better understand how dolphins perceive the world.  By placing the brain of a dolphin (who had washed up dead in Carolina) in an MRI machine, they were able to create the first ever picture of an entire dolphin brain with all its connections.  The beautiful image below is a computer simulation showing the different pathways in a dolphin’s brain...wow!

DTI scan of dolphin brain Professor G Berns

Brain facts:

Sperm whales have the biggest brains on the planet

Orcas have the second largest brains on the planet

Dolphins have a brain to body ratio second only to humans

Dolphins and all toothed whales have a section of their brains for echolocation – this means they can ‘see’ using sonar.

Please help whales and dolphins with a donation

These intelligent, cultural beings need our help. Human activity threatens their way of life and often their survival. Your donation will help us protect them.

Leave a Comment