In January, my class and I went on a field trip to Dolphin Quest in Dockyard.

We took the ferry from Hamilton directly to Dockyard. When we arrived, we walked to Dolphin Quest.

Dolphin Quest is situated in the Maritime Museum at Dockyard. They have a small `lagoon' area. The `lagoon' connects to the ocean. This means that the salt water goes up and down with the changing tides. Also, this means that fish and other ocean life can come in and out at their own will. This wildlife helps dolphins to use their echolocation, to track down prey. The trainers at Dolphin Quest are planning to expand the `lagoon' area out into the ocean.

We were met by Dolphin Quest's education officer Robyn Bungay. She asked us: "Why do dolphins use ultrasound? " We learned the answer to this question: "Dolphins have to communicate with the other dolphins to locate their prey or to find information about their surroundings and to locate sharks or other dangers."

The most interesting thing that Robyn told us about dolphins was how they can use their echolocation to actually paralyse small fish before eating them. I thought that was pretty cool!

Next we talked about how important sound is to dolphins. Robyn shook tins that contained different objects in them such as baseballs, golf balls and bouncy balls. She had us listen, guess what was in the tins, then we marked the answer on a piece of paper. My team got them all right!

Next, she showed us pictures of human babies that were still in the mother's uterus. Robyn explained how ultrasound scanners work. She explained how they send ultrasound (sound with a frequency greater than 20,000Hz that humans cannot hear) signals into the body and then the waves reflect off tissue and bones and show up on a screen. This process eventually shows you what the baby looks like. She showed us pictures from a 3D scanner. With this type of technology, doctors can tell if the baby will have any deformities or diseases before it is born. We learned that this type of 3D scanner is very expensive, so it's not used often.

It was then time for my group to go onto the dock and see how the ultrasound scanner worked on dolphins. There was a trainer in the water with an ultrasonic transducer in her hand and a pair of virtual reality goggles over her eyes - she could actually see into the dolphin's body with sound! The images were relayed to the small laptop screen for us all to see and the trainer showed us pictures of the ribs and the liver. With the ribs, she told us about how they showed up on the screen as a dark shadow - it was pretty cool.

After we left the dock, Robyn placed a type of microphone - called a "hydrophone" - into the water. The dolphins were fascinated by the hydrophone and swam around it making funny squeaking and clicking noises. The sounds were played through a speaker so we could hear what was going on under the water. Sometimes the dolphins would run into the microphone and it would make crackling noises. But when they were communicating, they made the coolest sounds. I found out that each dolphin has its own signature call. The baby or the mother knows whose call is whose. So, if a mother were to make her `signature' call, then the baby would come hurrying to her side.

After all this, my class and I went for a quick snack and then it was time for the ferry ride back. Despite it being really cold at Dockyard, I really enjoyed going on this trip and I hope Mr. Nick Wiffen will take us on more.