Villagers weep for dolphin

Main Stories, National
Source:

The National, Friday July 5th, 2013

 By DOROTHY MARK

A INJURED and crying dolphin that showed up at a North Coast village in Madang had villagers weeping at its plight on Wednesday.

  The dolphin swam onto the beach at the Kagur hamlet of Malas village and refused to return to sea, swimming back when it was taken out to sea.

Villager Betty Sain, who was walking on the beach, discovered the dolphin at about 4pm and immediately alerted others who spent the night comforting the stranded mammal. 

Community leader Peter Makan said he took the dolphin back into deeper water and tried to get it to swim out to sea.

“It swam out, turned and came back full speed and spread itself on the sand and cried helplessly. It made us all weep,” Makan said.

He said the dolphin had several round cuts on its body and villagers suspected that it had been caught up in a net.

Makan said the next morning, he reported the situation to the Madang provincial administration which sent some officers to help.

Three officers, helped by the villagers, lifted the dolphin and carried it to their vehicle 100m away but found that it had died from the injury and exhaustion.

The animal was then taken to the Ramu Bismark Nature Conservation Centre at Jais Aben outside Madang, but the officers were told to take it away and bury it.