The Dolphin Research Institute was formed to achieve the protection of dolphins in our region. We have addressed this over three decades, by conducting and supporting science to create a better understanding of our dolphins.
A PhD project we supported led to the publication of a paper by Dr Charlton-Robb et al. in 2011 which describes the Burrunan dolphin (Tursiops australis) as a new species resident in Port Phillip and the Gippsland Lakes.
This seemed to add important knowledge that we hoped would support greater protection of our local bottlenose dolphins.
On-going peer-review is a critical part of science. In this light, the International Committee for Taxonomy for marine mammals has rejected the Burrunan dolphin as a species in every annual review of the scientific status of all marine mammal species since 2011.
It’s important to reinforce that taxonomic classifications of animal and plant groups is an on-going part of science and it is not unusual to have major revisions of species and name changes based on research findings.
The most recent paper regarding the species status (Jedensjo et al. (2020)) is mentioned by the Taxonomic Committee and can be downloaded HERE.
The conclusion is that the resident bottlenose dolphins in Port Phillip and the Gippsland Lakes are Tursiops truncatus, the ‘common bottlenose dolphin’.
Based on the understanding in 2011, the Burrunan dolphin was listed under the Victorian Fauna and Flora Guarantee Act. This is under review and the possibility of the species being de-listed concerns some who see it could undermine the protection of these bottlenose dolphins.
The Institute views that the best available science should always inform decision making otherwise the system is at risk of breaking down by providing legal loop-holes or by omitting species or communities.
The Institute would support the listing of the communities of the resident bottlenose and common dolphins in Port Phillip and the resident bottlenose dolphins in the Gippsland Lakes, on the basis of their small and isolated populations.
In Victoria, dolphins are also afforded high levels of protection by the Marine Mammals Section of the Wildlife Act, so have effective legislated protection.
The International Committee for Taxonomy is composed of eminent specialists in marine mammal taxonomy and is a committee of the International Society for Marine Mammalogy (publishers of the prestigious journal “Marine Mammal Science”). Their entry about the species is included below and it is linked to the SMM site. (Updated May 2020)
The Burrunan dolphin Tursiops australis, described by Charlton-Robb et al. (2011), is not included here; its basis is questionable because of several potential problems: 1) the specimens were compared morphologically only with bottlenose dolphins from Australia; 2) despite the small sample sizes, the series overlapped in all metric characters and separation was possible only with multivariate analysis (which commonly resolves geographical forms within a species, e.g., see Perrin et al. (1999) and Perrin et al. (2011) for Stenella longirostris and Tursiops truncatus, respectively); 3) comparisons of external morphology and non-metric characters were made only with T. truncatus, to the exclusion of T. aduncus; and 4) support for important nodes in molecular trees suggesting phylogenetic separation was low. A rigorous re-evaluation of the relevant data and arguments is needed. Recently, Jedensjö et al. (2020) conducted a broader morphological comparison of Tursiops skulls from around Australia, including skulls of both T. truncatus and T. aduncus and their respective holotypes, and did not find support for the Burrunan bottlenose dolphin, T. australis, proposed by Charlton-Robb et al. (2011). Skulls previously classified as T. australis all fell well within the T. truncatus group. In contrast, Moura et al. (2020) placed T. australis within a T. aduncus clade based on a nuclear genetic phylogeny.