Dog alerted owner to stranded baby dolphin

A dog saved a baby dolphin on a beach in Gwynedd, north-west Wales, while fishing with her owner. Leia, a two-year-old Cocker Spaniel found the dolphin washed up on the Criccieth shore on Sunday morning while fishing with her owner, Rich Wilcock, 42 from Buckley. Rich said: “I was stood taking pictures and videos of the scenery when Leia started to make a right old fuss.
“She kept coming up to me, barking and nudging me, she must have smelt the dolphin from a mile off. At first I thought it was a baby shark, it was only about one and half foot but on a closer inspection I could see the blow hole on top of his head and realized it was a dolphin. There was nobody around for miles so I did what I could as gently as possible. I lifted him gently under the belly and popped him back amongst the waves and he swam away into deeper water.

“I combed the beach for a while afterwards and stayed for an hour or so to make sure he made it back out to sea.” A spokesperson for the Seawatch foundation said: “It’s probably a juvenile harbour porpoise, it does look quite small even for a porpoise. With the strong winds we are getting at the moment it is quite possible he just got blown out of the way and stranded rather than having anything seriously wrong with him, so let’s hope he made it back out to sea safely.

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“It’s great to see people (and dogs!) helping out wildlife and given the circumstances of the remote location Rich did a really good job with helping him back into the water. “If possible we do advise to call in BDMLR in to stranding cases to assess the animals condition but he looked quite lively and had no obvious injuries.” Rich said: “She is a very intelligent dog, more intelligent than most. We often see dolphins and porpoises swimming and playing in Cardigan Bay, Criccieth is a great spot in the summer to spot them.”