INTO THE BLUE
What ever became of "Missie", "Silver" and "Rocky"

This dolphin release project was called INTO THE BLUE and operated by a consortium of animal welfare and animal rights groups and organisations including: the Born Free Foundation (UK), Bellerive Foundation (Switzerland) and the World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA).

The three dolphins released were bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops truncatus). "Rocky" caught in the Florida Panhandle in 1971 and maintained at Marineland in Morecambe in the north of England; "Missie" caught off Biloxi, Texas in 1969 and maintained at Brighton Aquarium in the south of England; "Silver" believed to have been caught waters of Taiwan in 1978 and also housed at Brighton Aquarium.

They were moved to the Islands of Turks and Caicos in the Caribbean to a conch farm owned by Chuck Hess - founder of the islands local environment concern group: PRIDE (Foundation for the Preservation of reefs and Islands from Degradation and Exploitation). The conch farm lagoon was made available by Chuck Hess to the groups to serve as a rehabilitation centre prior to the release of the animals. Here they were to learn how to eat live fish, etc.

"Rocky" was transported to the conch farm lagoon from the UK on February 11, 1991; "Missie" and "Silver" on March 19, 1991.

The animals were moved from the conch farm to a floating seamen off West Caicos Island on September 7, 1991. They were released from this to the wild at 1.30.pm on Tuesday, September 10, 1991. All three animals had "freeze branding" on their dorsal fins.

The three animals were seen a day after release at this location. However "Missie" and "Rocky" have not been seen since this time by project staff; all sightings after this point were second hand by fisherman and tourists

"Silver" was seen after the release from September 16 - 29 by project staff. He appeared to have some weight lost and health problems (an infection on his rostrum) and was given both food (a total of sixty pounds) and antibiotics by project staff in the wild over this period.

• A picture of Silver taken at the above time can be found here.

He was also associating with a wild "friendly" dolphin that swam in this area called "Jojo". After this time all "Silver"s sightings were also second-hand by tourists and fishermen.

A photographic competition for local Turks and Caicos fisherman in January 1992, with a $500 cash prize, failed to produce photographic evidence of the animals continuing to survive in the wild.

The ultimate fate of these animals seems to remain unknown.