"It seemed as if that one visible eye kept looking pleadingly at me as if to say, 'I don't know what is going on here'," says Dr Johannes Meyer of Steenbras Street in Brenton-on-Sea about the striped dolphin he tried to persuade not to beach itself at sunset on on Sunday, January 29.

Coaxing the seemingly distraught animal back into deeper water, Meyer repeatedly swam with his arm around the dolphin, but as soon as he let him go, the dolphin would turn around and head straight back to the shore.

"It was absolutely heart-wrenching to watch. I must have swum out with him into deep water at least ten times, until it got too dark for me to see anymore," sighs Meyer.

Meyer and his girlfriend, Saskia Moulder, had noticed two fishermen trying to get a dolphin on dry sand, back into the water.
"It was an adult Stenella coeruleoalba of about 2.5m without any serious injuries as far as I could tell," says Meyer. "There were some chafe marks and minor bleeding on the tail-fin and underneath the animal, most probably from when it passed over nearby rocks, but he seemed strong and was flapping his tail-fin in a swimming motion. With everyone's help we got him back into the shallow water and from there I began taking him deeper."

The waves were about 2m tall, but once in deep water the dolphin swam strongly and Meyer could feel the animal's strength.
"Yet, the moment I let go and swam back, he turned around and seemed determined to end up in the shallow water again, where the waves soon began washing him ashore. Eventually I swam with him into a rip-current in the hope that it would take him out to sea, but he swam with determination against it and to shore. Eventually we were just exhausted and it was dark, so Saskia and I bid him a sad farewell and went home with heavy hearts."

The next morning, Monday, January 30, Meyer was surprised to see that the lone dolphin had survived the night and was lying on the dry sand again. As Meyer had to leave for his practice in George, he contacted Graeme Harding of NSRI to coordinate a rescue effort at the obviously inaccessible spot.

"Interestingly enough, Saskia and I have a very intimate bond with dolphins and it's just unthinkable that even these beautiful and highly intelligent striped dolphins are still being caught and eaten in Japan. If a dolphin repeatedly beaches itself, its most probably ill and cannot be saved."

There are two things, Meyer says, that he will always remember about this tender encounter during this animal's last hours - "The warmth of its breath from its blow-hole as I swam with my arm around him and the way its huge eye just looked at me, begging an explanation of the predicament it was in. I was incredibly touched by this experience."

The assessment
On Monday, a team of experts rushed to the aid of the dolphin. The team consisted of Keith Spencer, conservation manager of Cape Nature, and rangers of the Goukamma Nature Reserve's marine protected area as well as those of SANparks. Dr Pieter Jordaan of George Rex Vetinary Clinic joined the team later.

Jordaan says that since the dolphin had reportedly beached itself the previous afternoon, it had been on the beach for at least 18 hours. A detailed assesment of the animal, indicated, "It was severely distressed and dehydrated. The ventral lighter-coloured body parts were badly sunburnt. Reflexes were slow and weak and tachycardia was present."

To reach the dolphin the team had to climb down a steep pathway and walk about 300m on the beach. Nature Conservation called Jordaan to the scene at about 11:45 and he reached the dolphin at 12:45. Following the thorough assessment, it was decided to euthanise the animal. A very concentrated anaesthetic was used to suppress all brain and organ function. A vein on the dorsal aspect of the tail flipper was used and the dolphin died almost instantaneously.

"By the time the dosage of the drug was fully injected, the animal was dead - I made sure that it was dead by examining the heartbeat, respiration and tongue and swallowing reflexes before leaving the scene," explains Jordaan.
"This was the first dolphin that I have euthanised and it was a very sad moment and unpleasant experience, but we had to relieve its suffering."

The next day, on Tuesday, Janaury 31, Tracy Meintjies with Luigi and Caroline Lattino of the Orca Foundation went to the site to dissect the carcass on behalf of the local expert, Dr Vic Cockcroft, who has been studying dolphins and whales along the coast for more than thirty years. (Due to an injury Cockcroft was unable to make the steep climb.)
"We will be sending the relevant information and tissue samples to Bayworld in Port Elizabeth at a later stage," says Meintjies.
According to Greg Hofmeyr of Bayworld's marine department (Seals) and curator of the marine mammal collection of the Port Elizabeth Museum, this collection contains over 4 000 specimens and is one of the largest in the world.
"These specimens are used by biologists from all parts of the world for their studies. We collect specimens from whales, dolphins and seals that strand along the South African coast between Mossel Bay and the Mozambique border to add to the collection."

Why would a dolphin beach itself?
"I doubt that any dolphin ever has a death wish. The circumstances related to each stranding event are not easy to assess. However, it is possible that this dolphin was ill or injured in some way and was no longer able to swim properly. It may have been unable to swim against currents that brought it ashore, or have been trying to find a way of supporting itself," explains Hofmeyr.
He confirmed that Cockcroft, former curator of the PE Museum's marine mammal collection and now of the Centre for Dolphin Studies in Plettenberg Bay, will be doing the necropsy.

Says Hofmeyr: "He will take a standard set of samples for the collection, which will be stored for future studies, and also tissue samples that may enable us to determine if the dolphin was suffering from injury or disease."
Cockcroft has dealt with most of the whales and dolphins that have stranded in the Garden Route over the years.

Status
Striped dolphins, like all marine mammals, are protected under the Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA).
Striped dolphins are some of the most abundant and widespread dolphins in the world. The male dolphins can reach lengths of about 2.7m and weigh up to 160kg, and the females can reach 2.4m and 150kg. Their distinct and striking coloration pattern, with a complex of bold thin stripes extending from the eye to the flipper and another set of stripes down the side of the body to the anal region, distinguishes it from other cetacean species, and is the origin of its common name.

Striped dolphins are usually found in tight, cohesive groups averaging between 25 and 100 individuals, but they have occasionally been seen in larger groups of up to several hundred and even thousands of animals. Within these schools there is a complex system of individuals that may be organised by age, sex, and breeding status. Their surface behaviour is often characterised as sociable, athletic, energetic, active, and nimble with rapid swimming. They can often be observed breaching, 'roto-tailing' (a circular motion using the tail while jumping out of the water), jumping, and leaping up over 7m above the surface of the water. The estimated lifespan of these dolphins is up to 58 years.

Habitat
Striped dolphins prefer highly productive tropical to warm temperate waters of 10-26°C that are oceanic and deep. These dolphins are often linked to upwelling areas and convergence zones. Their range includes Greenland, northern Europe (United Kingdom, Denmark), the Mediterranean Sea, and Japan to Argentina, Western Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.

Threats
Striped dolphins are taken as bycatch or interact with a number of fisheries, such as in pelagic trawls, gillnets, driftnets, purse seine nets, and hand-harpoons. They have been subjected to horrific drive-hunts in Japan and taken in the Caribbean and Sri Lanka. During the mid-twentieth century it is estimated that as many as 21 000 animals were caught and killed each year. In the early 1990s, more than 1 000 dolphins died in the Mediterranean Sea from a morbillivirus epizootic, which may have been triggered by pollution and fewer available prey. Environmental toxins and contaminants lower the disease immunity of these animals.