Do whales use tools?

By Stéphanie Tremblay

This week, a video was swirling around several social media in which a male dolphin could be seen bringing a sponge to a female. This curious behaviour has raised many questions not only amongst scientists, but the general public as well. Is this the only way that whales use tools?

A few studies have examined the use of tools in dolphins in their natural habitat. There are a multitude of reasons that might motivate a dolphin to use something other than its own body in different situations such as breeding or feeding.

From what we can gather in this video that has gone viral, a male dolphin wants to court a female. For him, using a sponge might be a means of expressing his reproductive instinct. Indeed, Australian humpback dolphins (Sousa sahulensis), “present marine sponges [to females] and engage in physical posturing and acoustic displays,” explain Allen and his team in an article published in October 2017 in the scientific journal Nature. This study reveals that Australian humpback dolphins offer sponges for breeding purposes rather than for playing or feeding, since only males behave this way. Males therefore swim from female to female to offer this sort of “gift”, but only to those that are sexually mature.