:12:02
sometimes brutal
:12:03
aspects of society
:12:09
shark bay
in western australia
:12:11
where vast sea
grass beds support
:12:14
a large community
of bottlenose dolphins
:12:17
here an international
team of scientists
:12:20
investigates
dolphin aggression
:12:25
the waters of shark
bay are in the throes
:12:27
of what appears
to be a gang fight
:12:29
groups of males are observed
chasing down other males
:12:33
it can go on for hours
and cover miles of territory
:12:41
the battles are over females
:12:43
part of an extremely complex social
system only now being unraveled
:12:49
by dr. Richard connor from the
university of massachusetts
:12:53
he's spent his professional life
studying dolphins in the wild
:12:57
and his work has changed
our image of the dolphin
:13:03
i think in the 1960's
the myth was generated
:13:06
that dolphins were
all sweetness and light
:13:08
and almost incapable
of aggression
:13:11
at least that was
the public perception
:13:13
carried on a large
part until today
:13:15
dolphins are capable of
a lot of aggression
:13:18
they can be quite nasty
depending on the circumstance
:13:21
they are complex
:13:23
intelligent social mammals
and that carries
:13:25
with it a range of behaviors from
the nice to the not so nice
:13:30
just like in our own species
:13:33
and like our own species
:13:35
dolphins are
highly individualistic
:13:39
to study their relationships
:13:40
connor needs to clearly
recognize individuals
:13:44
he does this by their
unique fin markings
:13:50
he's studied them in
shark bay since 1982
:13:53
and he knows over
three hundred dolphins by name
:13:57
and minnie right there
between them.