A lucky boater was in the right place at the right time to be able to film stunning footage of a super pod of dolphins playing in the sea off the coast of Ireland.
Richard O’Flynn had taken his boat out near the coast of Baltimore, West Cork when he saw hundreds of dolphins jumping out of the water and ‘spy-hopping’.
Spy-hopping is a term for when dolphins jump out of the water to take a look around.
Throughout the day the dolphins went from Baltimore harbour to Cape Clear Island and Richard and his family followed them all the way.
There were hundreds of dolphins, which probably means that a number of pods had joined to form a ‘super pod’. This often happens in areas where there is an abundance of food and numbers can reach over a thousand.
Richard told Breakingnews.ie: “The sun was out, the sea was calm. It was hard to make out where the ocean stopped and the sky began.
“A super pod of common dolphins were feeding and spy-hopping as far as the eye could see.
“At one stage, there were over 30 alone under the bow of the boat riding the bow wave. We stayed with the dolphins for two hours and followed them the whole way out to Cape Clear Island.”
Take a look at video below of the dolphins.
It isn’t the first remarkable video Richard has captured. In November 2014, he was also fortunate enough to be in the sea when a humpback whale was feeding in the Baltimore coast. The whale was joined by some dolphins.
Richard said: “Baltimore is fast becoming the whale and dolphin capital of Ireland.”
Take a look at the video of the whales below.
For more from Richard visit his Facebook page, Best Photos of Baltimore