A report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture revealed that the dolphins at the Miami Seaquarium were not being properly nutritioned after 60 percent of their food rations were cut resulting in thin animals.
According to the report by the USDA, the assistant director of animal training consulted with corporate trainers and the animal care specialists manager to decrease the diets of nine of the 12 dolphins at Dolphin Harbor.
The report stated multiple dolphins were very thin with at least one dolphin’s ribs showing. The report also said that many of the dolphins experienced regurgitation during training sessions after the diet change.
General Manager Patrick Pearson told NBC 6 the new company that took over operations at the Miami Seaquarium earlier this year noticed some of the dolphins were overweight and that a miscommunication led to the staffers cutting the diet of some of the dolphins without direct involvement of the veterinarian.
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Pearson also said they slowly started feeding the dolphins more food over time and all of the dolphins are now at healthy weights. Pearson added that the Seaquarium has new protocols in place to make sure every diet decision happens on the advice of a vet.
"[The dolphins] are all completely healthy today," Pearson said. "There were some issues with communication, frankly, because we were implementing our procedures and we were still trying to find our way at this property. The veterinarians weren't consulted about those diet changes. We acknowledge that and we have fixed that problem."
According to Pearson, they have also installed new software that tracks the weights of the dolphins, and alerts the staff and veterinarian to changes.
