I stopped at the beach on the way into town today and discovered that the snorkelers had
been enjoying a session with spinner dolphin for about 20 minutes already. It looked like
the pod was headed south but I decided to change plans and see if I could maybe see some
stragglers in the water if I got out there in time.
On the way out I had a school of half beaks come in at me so I figured that spinners were still
in the area. I saw a couple juveniles coming my way but then some adults came and got them
to follow them and away from me. I did end up with a small group headed south that swam
close by and then under me. The lighting angle was not great for photos.

I spotted a reasonably large calf swimming beneath and next to its mother and I focused on the pair for the most part. In the image below, the calf is below its mother (right side)




Calf and mother are to the right in photos above and below.



Mother and calf in shot above.
The group all surfaced for air at the same time and then went back down.

A couple times I saw the calf invert while swimming under the mother and I realized it was
likely feeding. This suspicion was further supported when I saw the calf's mouth moving one
time as it disengaged from beneath its mother. The next time I saw this, I went for a shot but
was a bit late and caught the calf as it separated from its mother and was rolling back to normal:

When youngsters are around there are usually adults that will swim close to you and likely in
attempt to distract you. That was the case for me today but I intentionally kept my eyes on
the mom and calf this time. I did go for some parting shots of a distractors though when I broke
off from the group:

