Why do marine mammals sometimes mass strand?
Most marine mammals travel in pods which are groups of animals. When a single or even a few members of the pod get sick and seek shallow water, so does the rest of the pod. Experience has shown that the sickest animals are probably the leaders (who are often the oldest animals) and have led the rest of the pod into shallow waters where they all strand. Pods are often very tightly-knit groups and our experience has shown that there is a lot of reluctance to leave sick animals that are part of the pod. A lot of these instances show that not only have the sickest animals not eaten in a while, but even the healthier ones are dehydrated and malnourished as well.
