BRITISH MAMMALS 
Genus Tursiops. 
THE BOTTLE-NOSED DOLPHIN, 
Tursiops tursw, Fabricius. 
Plate 50. 
Apart from colour and size, the chief external difference between this 
species and its near relation the Common Dolphin, lies in the shape of the 
beak, which in the Bottle-nosed Dolphin is short and depressed and has the 
lower jaw slightly longer than the upper. It has also fewer teeth, possessing 
only from twenty to twenty-five pairs in each jaw. 
The total length of the animal is from 8 to 10 feet. 
The colour of the upper part of the head and body, including the fins 
and tail, is a glossy purplish or greyish black, the margin of the upper lip to 
the point of the beak, greyish white, the lower jaw, throat and belly, white. 
In some individuals the colour of the under parts is dark grey marked with 
patches of white. 
This Dolphin is not uncommon off the coasts on either side of the 
Atlantic, in America ranging as far south as the Gulf of Mexico, and in 
Europe occurring in the North Sea, Bay of Biscay, and Mediterranean 
(Millais). A good many have been captured on the English coasts, the 
first recorded having been a female taken along with a sucker near Berkeley, 
and described by John Hunter in 1787. 
Its occurrence in Northern Britain seems to be less frequent, though it 
appears from time to time along the Scottish shores. In October 1901 a 
party of six were stranded at Inverness. 
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