Posted on 08/17/2006 10:49:15 AM PDT by Cagey
A lucky adolescent male bottlenose dolphin is back to living nude and free in Gulf Coast Florida's Sarasota Bay after making a potentially fatal wardrobe choice early this summer.
The 10-year-old dolphin, known as Scrappy, probably owes its life to a Brookfield Zoo marine mammal research team that works year round in the bay.
The drama began July 6, when a member of the team working in the bay spotted Scrappy unaccountably and uncomfortably swimming around while wearing a black, Speedo-brand man's bikini swimsuit.
"He must have found the swimsuit floating in the water," said Randall Wells, a population biologist who runs the Sarasota Dolphin Research Program for the Chicago Zoological Society, Brookfield Zoo's parent organization.
"Somehow he got his head and torso through the waist and one of the leg holes of the suit, and it was hugging him right where his pectoral fins and body meet."
The project team, which has been tracking and observing 150 resident dolphins in the bay for the last 36 years, began looking for Scrappy every day. They feared the tight-fitting, non-rotting synthetic cloth suit could injure or kill the dolphin as "drag" force from swimming pushed it into the soft skin in front of the pectoral fins.
"Eventually it could cut deeply enough to sever arteries, causing him to bleed," Wells said.
When the swimsuit was still stubbornly clinging to Scrappy after three weeks, the team got an emergency rescue authorization from federal officials who monitor its work in the bay.
Scrappy's capture turned into an all-day ordeal for the depantsing team Wells organized Aug. 3. Five fast boats carrying 31 people raced across the bay after the animal, trying to surround it with a net.
(Excerpt) Read more at sun-sentinel.com ...
71 when I was a kid is not 71 now......I'm thinking more like 81 before a speedo is acceptable.
Trust me, in that pic, the only way to preserve your eyes (rather than rip them out of their sockets,) is to concentrate on the key...
What an image that provokes!!
Isn't that the guy from Virgin Airlines and Virgin Records...if it is (and judging from the picture) I now understand the obsession with the name virgin.
The mullet was enough to convince me the picture needed to be posted, the farmers tan, pierced ear and non-svelt body in the speedo were icing on the cake...
Perhaps this is representative of the virgins awaiting terrorists?
Fred Reid, CEO Virgin Airlines
Could be.
After this, anything else you see today will be acceptable.
He's as scary-looking as Chappateddy! Now I have to go flush my eyeballs.
Bring lots of baggy trunks!
Re: #23
This guys looks waaaaay to GAY for a dolphin thread!!
YOU should be jailed for posting that!
I saw that picture. All I saw was a key!
i hope it isn't because you wear a speedo and think he looks good! ; )
LOL! I think he is the reason for that billboard in post #18.
you're another one that needs jailed for cruel and unusual pics!
It's difficult to tell Hillary's backside from Ted Kennedy's front side! LOL!
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