Name: F217

Sex: Female

Age: Born 2007

We’ve known F217 since she was born in 2007 to a dolphin we call Big Shout (F141). We’ve observed F217 more than 280 times since her birth. F217 became the first documented mom of 2022, when we observed her with a calf on April 26! Calf 2172 is her second documented calf; her first was 2171 born in 2017.

A Special Note About the Audio Recording

In collaboration with numerous colleagues over the past 35 years, our dolphin communication research team has collected thousands of hours of acoustic recordings from members of the resident Sarasota bottlenose dolphin community, with a focus on individually distinctive signature whistles. Recordings have been made during periodic health assessments, when we are able to obtain high-quality recordings of known individual dolphins. We are currently in the process of systematically assembling a verified signature whistle catalog, with multiple samples from each of the approximately 1,000 unique recording sessions of almost 300 individual dolphins. Members of this collaborative team, and our student researchers, come from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, the University of North Carolina Wilmington, University of St. Andrews, and Hampshire College. Learn more about dolphin communication.