If ever Dusty aspired to be a glamour girl she had her chance this summer in Doolin Harbour. The pier provides an excellent view upon near and far, the ferries were affectionately welcomed by her and to the waiting passengers she was an exiting side-show. Moreover the landing down the steps was a favorite meet and greet and to the aquatically challenged the slipway gave a trustworthy wave shade.
For Dusty it was vital to combine pleasure with caution. The scar of parallel cuts that showed like man-inflicted rake marks on her tailstock in the early summer must have been a severe warning to stay clear from the thundering maelstrom behind the ferries and the kids jumping off the pier to her were like airstrikes she quickly learned to give a wide berth to.
In order to have command about her whereabouts Dusty needs to move. Thus she can direct herself to where she wants to go and keep out of harms way. In motion she can maneuver and if need be, make a dash for safety. Like the time a boat that was being hauled upon the slipway on a trailer, broke loose and stormed towards her. She exploded away from the splash, leaving a deep vortex.
In the first VIDEO you can see her steeply moving up her head to take a breath and survey where she's going. This is just one of a broad range of dynamic profiles she can assume.
When Dusty is lying still she has to maintain balance, but, unlike humans, she is not anchored to something solid by gravity. For her the nearest to solid is her own body mass. But that is not absolutely stationary either. Every move she makes is pushed off against her mass, but that also has to be counteracted to stay in overall control. You can see very clearly how she does this in the next VIDEO.
In the first minute she is absorbed by me readjusting my weight belt. Then she turns to George who's drawing her attention to the bottle. She is in an upright position and maintains this by minute balancing, a weightless ballet as if in space, her finhold being the relative inertia of water. The movement of her head following the bottle is the activity that is sustained by her body maneuvering.
Then she decides there is no more point in waiting for George to throw the bottle, floats up to a horizontal position and swims off. In the background you just see a flash of George making an angel-ascent.
I can't recall ever having seen her go vertical near the pier. That is of course partly due to the general shallowness, but at the higher tide this would not be impossible. But the human related hazards there are multiple and she can't afford to neglect her getaway options.
The concept of pushing yourself off against mass works for humans as well in a very different way. After I empty my toilet bucket down at the sea I always take along some clean sea water up the rocks again. By this weight I can not only improve my balance, but also 'pull myself up' on the counterweight on my stretched out arm.
And thus the dolphin universe provides copy-right free enlightenment by the application of gravity.