During the past four years, researchers who study the common bottlenose dolphins swimming this part of the Potomac have hardly been able to keep up with their numbers. We hear from one of the world’s foremost dolphin experts and the president of a … “Over the past four years, researchers from Georgetown University’s Potomac-Chesapeake Dolphin Project have been cataloguing dolphins in the lake-like area where the Potomac joins the Chesapeake Bay, reports Bruillard for the Post. Ongoing research by the Potomac-Cheseapeake Dolphin Project—the first of its kind, headed up by the bottlenose expert Janet Mann of Georgetown University—has counted around 500, and the numbers keep climbing. “She’d been flying thousands of miles away to study dolphins,” says Jacoby. The Potomac-Chesapeake Dolphin Project's (PCDP) mission is to better understand and protect the Dolphins are making their way through the Potomac River off the coast of Washington, D.C., and scientists are looking to the public for names to give the migrating mammals. River Otters. Dolphins Are Finally Living and Breeding in the Potomac River Again. Researchers have found more than 1,000 bottlenose dolphins in the Potomac River - an area that was once so badly polluted it was called a 'national disgrace' by President Lyndon B. Johnson. “We’re now moving on to Supreme Court justices.” They also have some catchup work to do: “Now that we have a new president, we’re naming a dolphin after [him],” says Jacoby. It had to be Benjamin Franklin.”. Both Mann and Jacoby have spotted the baby in the weeks since, swimming the Potomac where it was born. Well, a dolphin named after her did. Mann and her research team, most of them student volunteers, have been focused on the dolphins’ presence in the Potomac, working to understand how many there are and why they come. While it’s still questionable whether the Potomac is safe for humans, one species of animal is thriving in the river waters: dolphins. After a massive traffic jam on the Chesapeake Bay Bridge, Maryland Transportation officials apologize. Having spent 30 years studying wild bottlenose dolphins 13,000 miles away, in Western Australia, Janet Mann was overjoyed to encounter them in the Potomac River, literally in her backyard. The roughly 1,000 wild bottlenose dolphins using the area have been recorded traveling as far up the Potomac as the Rt. Approximately 1,000 bottlenose dolphins have been spotted living and mating in the Potomac river this year. The dolphins made headlines in June when Potomac Conservancy invited the public to name two of the dolphins that PCDP has seen returning to the river summer after summer. © 2020 Atlas Obscura. “It’s an incredibly rare event.”. See more of Potomac Conservancy on Facebook. They're bottlenose dolphins, too! “Not many people know that there are dolphins in the Potomac River,” says Ann-Marie Jacoby, a field investigator with the PCDP. “Bottlenose dolphins provide a really great conservation opportunity,” says Jacoby. Consider supporting our work by becoming a member for as little as $5 a month. The photograph above is by Megan Wallen (G’17), while the other photos of dolphins were taken by graduate student Ann-Marie Jacoby (C’13). Researchers have found more than 1,000 bottlenose dolphins in the Potomac River - an area that was once so badly polluted it was called a 'national disgrace' by President Lyndon B. Johnson. 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