I, for one, would like to welcome our hoop jumping, tuna munching overlords.

At the Institute for Marine Mammal Studies in Mississippi, Kelly the dolphin has quite a reputation. All the institute’s dolphins are trained to hold onto any litter that falls into their pools until they see a trainer, when they can trade the litter for fish. Kelly took this task one step further. When people drop paper into the water she hides it under a rock at the bottom of the pool. The next time a trainer passes, she tears off a piece of paper to give to the trainer. After a fish-reward, she goes back down, tears off another piece of paper, gets another fish, and so on. This behaviour is particularly interesting because it suggests that Kelly has a sense of the future and delays gratification.

At Kewalo Basin Marine Laboratory in Hawaii, Lou Herman and his team have developed a sign language to communicate with the dolphins, and the results are remarkable. Not only do the dolphins understand the meaning of individual words, they also understand the significance of word order in a sentence. For example, they generally responded correctly straight away to “touch the Frisbee with your tail and then jump over it.” This has the characteristics of true under- standing, not rigid training.

Just how bloody smart are these dolphins anyway? [Environmental Graffiti]