CALDWELL ET AL. : CETACEANS OF ST. VINCENT 



Figure 2. — Stenella, species B, 172.5-cm male spotted dolphin (SV-l-SF) landed at Barrouallie, St. Vincent, 

 on 24 May 1968. Photograph made under conditions of adver.se lighting several hours after the animal had been 

 harpooned and kept in the sun in an open boat at sea. (Photograph by William A. Huck.) 



nomic situation in which one finds the spotted 

 dolphins of this genus. 



The Caldwells have had considerable exper- 

 ience in Florida with carcasses and live speci- 

 mens of the spotted species S. phtqiodon (Cope) 

 (see D. K. Caldwell and M. C. Caldwell, 1966) 

 and do not believe that that species as they 

 understand it is the same as the St. Vincent 

 form. Perrin (1970) concurred that S. plagi- 

 odon is separable from S. frontalis at least on 

 the basis of color pattern. We concur with 

 Mitchell (1970: pi. .5) that the spotted dolphin 

 he pictured as having been taken from conti- 

 nental shelf waters near Trinidad is best as- 

 signed to the species S. plagiodon. Despite the 

 relatively close proximity of the Trinidad record 

 to St. Vincent (some 275 km), we believe that 

 two species of spotted dolphins are involved and 

 that Mitchell's record bears out an earlier con- 

 tention by the Caldwells (D. K. Caldwell and 

 M. C. Caidwell, 1966: 2) that S. plagiodon is a 

 species found primarily in offshore waters near 

 continents. Around the seemingly more isolated 

 noncontinental islands of the Antilles, at least, 

 it appears in our experience to be replaced by 

 S. cf. frontalis or some very similar spotted spe- 

 cies. We believe, therefoi-e, that Rice and 



Scheffer (1968) wei-e too conservative in their 

 conclusions regarding spotted dolphins and that 

 more than one species exists. 



A mandible, reported as Prodelphimis sp., but 

 probably of the same species as ours from St. 

 Vincent, was listed from nearby Barbados by 

 Turner (1912: 138). The next closest western 

 Atlantic record (as Prodelphinus froenatus) is 

 from southeastern Florida (Allen, 1925) to the 

 north. It ap])arently has not been recorded to 

 the south (see Hershkovitz, 1966: 36). 



Feresa attenuata GRAY — 

 PYGMY KILLER WHALE 



An adult skull (SV-l-FA) of undetermined 

 sex was obtained from the fishery in the sjjring 

 of 1969. A detailed report on this specimen was 

 prepared (Caldwell and Caldwell, 1971) as 

 it then was the first record for the western 

 Atlantic. After this report was accepted for 

 publication, a record from Texas was published 

 (James, Judd, and Moore, 1970) . To our knowl- 

 edge the St. Vincent specimen is still the only 

 record from the Caribbean and West Indian 

 region. 



307 



