‘Lonely’ Dolphin Was Recorded Talking to Himself, and I’m Ready to Travel the Baltic Sea for Him

A dolphin in the Baltic Sea has been talking to himself—possibly because he’s lonely (…and now I am searching for ways to interact with him).

The bottlenose dolphin—a particularly social species—has been spending solo time near the Svendborgsund channel. So much time, in fact, that he’s earned the name “Delle” from locals.

The channel isn’t commonly occupied by bottlenose dolphins, however, so researchers wanted to understand how Delle’s presence might affect other inhabitants like porpoises. Through the use of underwater recording devices, they were able to pick up a ton of commotion from this one independent creature.

“Out of curiosity, I decided to add a recorder that captures actual sounds,” Olga Filatova, cetacean biologist at the University of Southern Denmark and lead author of the study, told Live Science.

“I thought we might pick up a few distant whistles or something along those lines,” she added. “I certainly didn’t anticipate recording thousands of different sounds.”

These “sounds” included whistles, burst pulses, low-frequency tonal sounds, and percussive sounds.

Filatova explained to LiveScience: “Bottlenose dolphins have what are known as signature whistles, believed to be unique to each individual, much like a name. If we hadn’t known that Delle was alone, we might have concluded that a group of at least three dolphins was engaged in various social interactions.”

However, because Delle was completely alone—with no other bottlenecks or even human paddleboarders in sight—the sounds indicated that he might just be communicating with himself. You know, kinda like how we humans talk to ourselves when no one else is around. (Just me?)

Researchers also believe these noises might mean Delle feels lonely in his solitude. I think it’s time I learn how to paddleboard in the Baltic Sea…