
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, July 12, 1993                   TAG: 9307120066
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH                                LENGTH: Short

ALL ALONG ATLANTIC, VOLUNTEERS HIT BEACHES FOR DOLPHIN COUNT

Hundreds of volunteers scanned Atlantic Ocean waters from fishing piers, rooftops and cliffs in an attempt to count the dolphin population.

For one hour Saturday morning, researchers and volunteers dotted beaches from Georgia to New Jersey in a census sponsored by the Virginia Marine Science Museum in Virginia Beach. The census involved 42 research stations between the North Carolina and Maryland state lines.

"We may be the only state going from border to border," said W. Mark Swingle, who heads the museum's dolphin research team and coordinated the Virginia count.

The preliminary results of the Virginia census showed 295 dolphins counted. Most of the dolphins, or 209, were seen off Virginia Beach near the North Carolina border. The rest were off the Eastern Shore.

The final tally will give marine scientists an estimate of the minimum number of dolphins known to swim within a mile offshore during the summer.

The numbers will be on the conservative side because dolphins spend 90 percent of their time underwater and are in constant motion, making them difficult to count.

"No matter what number we get, we need to qualify that it's not the number of dolphins in Virginia, but the number of dolphins that were here on the morning of July 10 that we could see," Swingle said.

by CNB