One of the world’s rarest whales, a Bahamond’s beaked whale, was reported washed up on a beach in New Zealand’s South Island this month, the country’s conservation agency said on Monday.
There are no records of live sightings of this whale (Mesoplodon traversii), and no one knows how many of the animals there are or where they live in the vast expanses of the South Pacific Ocean.
The five-metre-long creature was identified after arriving on an Otago beach by the colour and shape of its skull, beak and teeth.
“We know very little, virtually nothing” about these whales, said Hannah Hendricks, a marine technical adviser to the New Zealand Department of Conservation, quoted by the US news agency Associated Press (AP), who noted that it was “incredible” from a scientific point of view to be able to get “first-hand information.”
If the cetacean is confirmed to be the elusive Bahamund’s beaked whale, it would be the first specimen found in a condition that allows scientists to dissect it and relate it to the few other individuals found.
Only six other whales of this type have been identified, and those found intact on beaches in New Zealand’s North Island were buried before DNA tests could confirm they were Mesoplodon traversii, preventing their study.
This time, the stranded whale was quickly transported to a cold storage facility, and researchers are planning how they will study it in collaboration with the local Maori iwi tribe of New Zealand, who consider whales a sacred treasure.
The conservation agency said genetic testing to confirm the whale’s identity could take months.
“It’s very difficult to study marine mammals if you can’t see them at sea (…) If you don’t know where to look, it’s like finding a needle in a haystack,” Hendrix said.
Until now, nothing is known about the “habitat” of these whales, which dive deep in search of food and rarely surface, which makes it impossible to limit their distribution outside the South Pacific Ocean, where some of the deepest ocean trenches in the world are located, according to the scientist.
The first bones of Bahamondii’s beaked whale were found in 1872 on Pitt Island in New Zealand, another discovery was made on another island in the 1950s, and the bones of a third specimen were found on Robinson Crusoe Island in Chile in 1986. DNA sequencing in 2002 proved that they all belonged to the same species and were distinct from other beaked whales.
Researchers were unable to confirm whether the species was extinct, and in 2010 the bodies of two intact beaked whales were found on a New Zealand beach. They were initially confused with one of New Zealand’s 13 other most common beaked whale species, but tissue samples taken before they were buried later revealed them to be a mystery species.
According to the Department of Conservation, whale strandings are very common in New Zealand, with more than 5,000 recorded since 1840.
Author: Lusa
Source: CM Jornal
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