Welcome back: Dolphins spotted in Bronx River, a sign of cleaner waters
Dolphins have been spotted swimming in the Bronx River — a sign the once notoriously polluted waterway has become a healthy home for marine life, the Parks Department says.
“This is great news,” the department tweeted Thursday. “It shows that the decades-long effort to restore the river as a healthy habitat is working.”
The department attached a video of the dolphins playing in the water off Starlight Park, where borough residents gave the creatures a proper Bronx welcome.
“Yo, f-cking crazy, bro,” Nick Banko narrated as the dolphins surfaced.
“Somebody please explain to me why [the f-ck] is there dolphins in the f-cking park,” he captioned the video. “Sh-t had me shocked.”
But Marc Sanchez, deputy director of the NYC Parks Department’s Urban Park Rangers, said there’s no mystery.
“Animals are basically going to be wherever there’s food for them,” he told The Post Friday.
The Parks Department stocks the river with fish each year as part of its restoration efforts, Sanchez said, including species such as Alewife, which dolphins like to eat.
“It’s part of a long standing restoration effort — a multi-year project for at least as long as I’ve been with the Parks Department,” said Sanchez, who joined the agency in 2005.
“It’s certainly a testament to the improvement of the waters, that the water is able to sustain the fish,” he said.
Sanchez said in recent years aquatic mammals have been sighted more frequently in the city’s waterways, including seals, porpoises and more dolphins.
On Wednesday, Sanchez said, dolphins were also sighted in another historically polluted waterway, Newtown Creek, between Brooklyn and Queens.
Sanchez said the Parks Department has conducted seal-watching expeditions that curious New Yorkers can join.
But as aquatic mammals are sighted with increasing frequency, he asked people to give the creatures space — rather than crowd and photograph them.
“We’re very happy that the animals have been able to show themselves and make their presence known,” he said.
“It’s a great thing,” he added. “We should expect to continue to see them.”