Massive collection of dolphins

Anastasia
Phil May and Andrea Twigg
Sun 23 Oct 2011 01:23
32:48.8N 9:29.3W
 
Light winds.  We have been motoring for 24 hours now to try and get as far south as possible before a depression to our north points a strong wind in our face.
 
Andrea and Denise, who are doing the "breadmaking" watch from 6am to 10am, had another good dolphin show with the dolphins jumping over the sun as it rose.  But the show of the day had to be the massive collection of dolphins we saw at at midday.  Denise spotted a disturbance in the water and thought it might be a whale, so we motored over to take a look and as we approached we saw the sea boiling with the bodies of hundreds of dolphins.  In one area they would be cruising with dorsal fins showing like sharks, so numerous that the fins looked like bristles on the sea.  In another area they would be darting around beneath the surface so that the sea was churning above them.  Everywhere you looked, for hundreds of yards around the boat, there were pods of dolphins.
 
We couldn't see what might have brought so many pods together at once.  We didn't see them eating fish, and there were far too many of them to be usefully fishing together anyway.  Some kind of migration?  A social gathering?  Something to google when we get back online.
 
Bertie nearly caught a fish today, at sunset.  There was definitely a large fish jumping on the end of the line, but it broke free taking the best lure with it.