Cascadia Research Collective

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Cascadia Research Collective Cascadia Research is a WA-based non-profit focused on whale and dolphin population research in the PNW.

To learn more about us, please visit our website at https://cascadiaresearch.org/
To support our work, visit https://cascadiaresearch.org/support_crc/

15/06/2026

A compilation video of our recent encounter with Fraser's dolphins in Hawai'i

10/06/2026

This week we had only our 12th encounter with Fraser's dolphins in Hawai'i in 28 years of working here. Fraser's dolphins are an open-ocean species, and they usually avoid boats, so we were excited to have a group that was moving slowly and interested in our research vessel. This is the first time we've ever been able to get drone footage of Fraser's dolphins, and we are sharing an unedited clip here.

If you want to learn more about our recent field effort, check out out field project update page at https://cascadiaresearch.org/hawaii-update/mayjune2026/

This was a collaborative project with the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program

Our next Hawai'i field effort will be off Kaua'i in August

Yesterday was the last day on the water for our Kona field project. We were out 10 days, covered 1289 km, and had 36 enc...
09/06/2026

Yesterday was the last day on the water for our Kona field project. We were out 10 days, covered 1289 km, and had 36 encounters with 12 different species of whales and dolphins (as well as many different species of seabirds, one oceanic manta ray, and one Hawaiian monk seal). Over the project we took over 64,000 photos, collected one squid and five genetic samples, deployed finmount satellite-linked tags on two species (including dive tags on both pantropical spotted dolphins and spinner dolphins), and obtained drone footage of two species (including our first-ever drone footage of one of them).

In our last two days we encountered three new species for the trip, including two encounters with melon-headed whales, one encounter with Fraser’s dolphins (the first time we’ve ever had a group bowriding and the first time we’ve obtained drone footage), and two encounters with goose-beaked whales. Check out our project web page for more information on this effort and to see the movements of our tagged dolphins (note the map on the site will be updating daily) - https://cascadiaresearch.org/hawaii-update/mayjune2026/

This project was a collaborative effort with the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program and was funded by grants from Dolphin Quest, the Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center, and the Office of Naval Research.

Thanks to Captain Zodiac for their support for this project, and to the 15 different volunteers we had out over the trip!

The photos here show an adult male Fraser's dolphin with the striking coloration, a pair of goose-beaked whales (the adult female in the back is HIZc052 in our catalog, first photographed in 2006 and last seen in 2025), and a close-up of the face of a bowriding Fraser's dolphin).

A review chapter on our collaborative work on analyses of dolphin and whale exposure to Navy mid-frequency active sonar ...
09/06/2026

A review chapter on our collaborative work on analyses of dolphin and whale exposure to Navy mid-frequency active sonar is out in “The Effects of Noise on Aquatic Life IV”. This is an open-access publication available at https://link.springer.com/rwe/10.1007/978-3-031-94229-7_4-1

This is a collaborative effort with researchers from NIWC Pacific and SEA Inc and is sponsored by the U.S. Navy Marine Species Monitoring Program

This work is continuing and we are looking forward to our next field project off Kaua‘i in August.

Our highlight yesterday was an encounter with s***m whales, our 8th species of cetacean for this trip! If you want to fo...
07/06/2026

Our highlight yesterday was an encounter with s***m whales, our 8th species of cetacean for this trip! If you want to follow along on what we are seeing and doing, check out https://cascadiaresearch.org/hawaii-update/mayjune2026/

This project is a collaborative effort with the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program

Two of the tags we have deployed on spinner dolphins provide information on dive depths and durations, and the duration ...
06/06/2026

Two of the tags we have deployed on spinner dolphins provide information on dive depths and durations, and the duration of the periods of time between dives. For spinners, we set the threshold for dives at 5 meters (~16 feet), to be able to document the shallow day-time dives. This plot shows an example of data coming in from the first spinner we tagged this project, showing a bit less than a day of data and really showing the strong difference between shallow day-time dives and deep night-time dives, when the animals move offshore for foraging, meeting up with organisms associated with the deep scattering layer as it rises to the surface after dark.

So far we’ve recorded exactly 1000 dives from this individual, with the deepest dive to 335 meters (1099 feet) and the longest dive of six and a half minutes.

Along the top of the plot it also shows “gaps” – periods of time when we have no data on either dives or surface periods. These gaps are a result of bandwidth limitation in transmitting the accumulated behavior data through the Argos satellite system. In other species we set the threshold of what is considered a dive deeper, in order to reduce the number of gaps.

If you want to see where this individual and the others we’ve tagged on this project have been spending their time since tagging, we’ve added a “live map” (with a one-day delay) to our project web page at https://cascadiaresearch.org/hawaii-update/mayjune2026/

This is a collaborative project with the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program and is funded by a grant from Dolphin Quest

Our Kona field projects are done in collaboration with Captain Zodiac and we stop for any netting or lines in the water ...
06/06/2026

Our Kona field projects are done in collaboration with Captain Zodiac and we stop for any netting or lines in the water that might pose an entanglement risk to dolphins or whales. For anything that will easily fit in the boat (sometimes we find a bundle of netting that would fill the boat) we remove it from the water. Yesterday we pulled up one net that had two dead Wedge-tailed Shearwaters entangled in the netting, the first time we've found dead birds in any of the gear.

In Hawai'i the Division of Boating and Ocean Recreation (DOBOR) has bins at many of the harbors for collecting discarded nets and fishing line, and we drop off collected material at the DOBOR office at Honokohau small boat harbor. If you are on the water and find netting, please collect it!

If you want to find out more about our current Kona field project, check out our project web page https://cascadiaresearch.org/hawaii-update/mayjune2026/

05/06/2026

Not surprisingly, tagging a dolphin usually produces a startle response, but one of the two spinner dolphins we tagged yesterday showed little response and remained off the bow of the boat - this was an adult male spinner dolphin, and while our sample size is small, it seems as if they may react less than subadults or females.

To learn more about this project and to see tracks of the movements of the dolphins check out our project web page at https://cascadiaresearch.org/hawaii-update/mayjune2026/

This is a collaborative effort with the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program

05/06/2026

The TADpole tool allows for tagging bowriding dolphins, placing the tag on the fin with a single pin, but the dolphins have to be moving slowly and surfacing predictably in front of the boat. This was a group of pantropical spotted dolphins a couple of days ago – after this we were successful in deploying a depth-transmitting satellite-linked tag on one individual. If you want to see where this individual and the others we’ve tagged on this project have been spending their time since tagging, we’ve added a “live map” (with a one-day delay) to our project web page at https://cascadiaresearch.org/hawaii-update/mayjune2026/

This is a collaborative project with the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program

Yesterday we encountered two groups of rough-toothed dolphins off Kona. Rough-toothed dolphins are known as "Steno" loca...
03/06/2026

Yesterday we encountered two groups of rough-toothed dolphins off Kona. Rough-toothed dolphins are known as "Steno" locally (also by scientists - Steno is the genus). A quick comparison with our catalog of this species revealed that these two individuals (HISb1180 to the left and HISb1182 to the right) were first photographed in April 2009, in the same group, and again together in December 2009 and August 2012*, illustrating the strong social bonds in this species. Although recognizable from the dorsal fin notches, pigmentation patterns in this species are individually distinctive and can also be used to identify individuals.

Seeing them many years ago in Hawai'i, in his 1974 book "The Porpoise Watcher", Ken Norris wrote that "he was struck by the resemblance of these Stenos to extinct ichthyosaurs, seagoing reptiles from the age of dinosaurs. Its long snout lined with stout, pointed teeth, the big brown protruding eyes, and the reptilian head contours are all part of this impression"

Check out more photos from yesterday's encounters on our project web page https://cascadiaresearch.org/hawaii-update/mayjune2026/

*They have probably remained together, and likely off this island, ever since, but we haven't had the resources to keep our rough-toothed dolphin catalog up to date.

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