Reprinted from FloridaGulfVacation.com, March 10, 2012.
A bottlenose dolphin named Seymour is swimming without restraint this morning in the waters near Marco Island. After members of the Ten Thousand Islands Dolphin Project reported seeing Seymour with fishing line wrapped around his tail since late last year, a team of experts and biologists mapped out a plan to untangle him. This is no small feat. It took a crew of wildlife experts from SeaWorld Orlando, the Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute in Fort Pierce, NOAA Fisheries Service and Harbor Branch, Mote Marine Laboratory, Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission and the University of Florida to accomplish the task – in all close to 30 people were involved.
Seymour is a regular in these waters so they knew where to begin looking for him. The Dolphin Explorer, a sightseeing boat out of Marco River Marina has spotted him hundreds of times. After spotting him Friday morning, rescuers put out a huge net and once he swam in, the rescuers jumped into the water, carefully cut away the fishing line, and even used a mobile x-ray machine to determine if there was further injury. Lucky for Seymour, he was deemed ok to be released back into the wild, after a satellite tag was placed on his dorsal fin.
If the story sounds familiar, it’s similar to what happened to Winter the Dolphin who lives at the Clearwater Marine Aquarium. Her tail had to be amputated when she became entangled and received the first-ever marine mammal prosthetic tail. The movie, Dolphin Tale, is based on her story.
“Discarded fishing line poses a very serious threat to all marine life, including manatees, sea turtles, and dolphins like Seymour,” said Steve Lehr of SeaWorld’s rescue team. “The easiest way to help is to always recycle fishing line properly in bins found at most docks.” That goes for plastic bags, too.
The crowd of onlookers who had gathered at the boat ramp, cheered as Seymour was released. What a great way to start the weekend.
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