{"id":877310,"date":"2026-09-02T10:26:13","date_gmt":"2026-09-02T10:26:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/877310\/"},"modified":"2026-09-02T10:26:13","modified_gmt":"2026-09-02T10:26:13","slug":"popular-tourist-activity-wiping-out-aussie-dolphins-experts-say","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/877310\/","title":{"rendered":"Popular tourist activity wiping out Aussie dolphins, experts say"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tourists feeding wild dolphins could single-handedly push the species toward extinction twice as fast as would otherwise have been the case, according to new research.<\/p>\n

The QUT-led international study<\/a> focused on Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphins in Bunbury, in Western Australia\u2019s south-west.<\/p>\n

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Scientists predict a WA population of about 350 dolphins could dwindle to just eight within the next 100 years.\u00a0iStock<\/p>\n

In the research, scientists predicted a WA<\/a> population of about 350 dolphins could dwindle to just eight within the next 100 years.<\/p>\n

While feeding wild dolphins is illegal in Australia, four locations have permission from state regulators to provide limited amounts of food for tourism.<\/p>\n

QUT lead author Dr Valeria Senigaglia warned of the domino effect caused by human interaction.<\/p>\n

\u201cFeeding dolphins has been correlated with high levels of begging behaviour, [such as] approaching vessels for handouts, which leads to inappropriate food or injury, and the removal of bait from fishing gear that could lead to entanglement.\u201d<\/p>\n

She also says it can lower reproduction success and offspring survival.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is because the dolphins face many other stressors from climate change, recreational watercraft, disease outbreaks and possible algae blooms, oil spills and habitat degradation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Using 10 years of data, researchers modelled how the population could fare over the next century under a range of scenarios.<\/p>\n

They examined differences between fed and non-fed dolphins, alongside the potential impacts of human-linked calf deaths, major oil spills, and outbreaks of morbillivirus \u2013 a highly contagious pathogen often described as the marine equivalent of measles.<\/p>\n

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Dr Valeria Senigaglia warned of the domino effect caused by human interaction.\u00a0Supplied<\/p>\n

Under current conditions, the modelling predicted the population would fall from about 350 dolphins to just eight in 100 years.<\/p>\n

Researchers found feeding was not the only contributor to the projected decline, and a morbillivirus outbreak would pose an even greater threat.<\/p>\n

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Senigaglia\u2019s research suggested feeding wild dolphins could single-handedly push the species towards extinction far quicker.\u00a0iStock<\/p>\n

However, feeding compounded the decline and doubled the probability of extinction.<\/p>\n

\u201cStopping this practice might increase dolphins\u2019 resilience and ability to withstand other, more severe, stressors.\u201d<\/p>\n

Researchers also considered the potential impact if Bunbury adopted conservation measures similar to those used in Scotland\u2019s Moray Firth.<\/p>\n

There, protection efforts halved calf mortality and doubled local dolphin fertility by cutting out food handouts, establishing a large protective zone, and dialling back recreational and industrial water activity.<\/p>\n

Researchers predicted those measures could increase the Bunbury dolphin population.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tourists feeding wild dolphins could single-handedly push the species toward extinction twice as fast as would otherwise have…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":877311,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[64,63,75,128],"class_list":["post-877310","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-environment","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/877310","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=877310"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/877310\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/877311"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=877310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=877310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=877310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}