People who think they know it all never are open to find out if they're right, do they?

The information is all out there and will keep us busy forever, looking to find it.

So glad if any of this are worth while to you. Thank you for your post, RKP5637.

May 20, 2022 Cell Press

. . .

If a human comes down with a rash, they might go to the doctor and come away with some ointment to put on it. Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphins get skin conditions, too, but they come about their medication by queuing up nose-to-tail to rub themselves against corals. In the journal iScience on May 19, researchers show that these corals have medicinal properties, suggesting that the dolphins are using the marine invertebrates to medicate skin conditions.

Thirteen years ago, co-lead author Angela Ziltener (@DWAORG), a wildlife biologist at the University of Zurich, Switzerland, first observed dolphins rubbing against coral in the Northern Red Sea, off the coast of Egypt. She and her team noticed that the dolphins were selective about which corals they rubbed against, and they wanted to understand why. “I hadn’t seen this coral rubbing behavior described before, and it was clear that the dolphins knew exactly which coral they wanted to use,” says Ziltener. “I thought, ‘There must be a reason.’”

Most dolphin research is conducted from the surface of the water, but because Ziltener is a diver, she was able to study the dolphins up close. It took some time to earn the trust of the pod, which she was able to do in part because these dolphins weren’t phased by the large bubbles released by the diving tanks and habituated towards divers. “Some dolphins, like spinner dolphins in the Southern Egyptian Red Sea, are shyer regarding bubbles,” she says.

Once the pod allowed her to visit them regularly, she and her colleagues were able to identify and sample the corals that the dolphins were rubbing on. Ziltener and her team found that by repeatedly rubbing against the corals, Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphins were agitating the tiny polyps that make up the coral community, and these invertebrates were releasing mucus. In order to understand what properties the mucus contained, the team collected samples of the coral.

More:
https://scienceblog.com/530707/watch-dolphins-line-up-to-self-medicate-skin-ailments-at-coral-clinics/

🐬 🐬 🐬 🐬 🐬 🐬 🐬 🐬 🐬 🐬