Whale stranding sheds new light on mysterious species
"A True's beaked whale stranding indicates problems in the marine ecosystem (Image by Dylan Walker)"
One of the world鈥檚 most mysterious species of whale was stranded in Britain for the first time, according to new research.
The female True鈥檚 beaked whale was found at Kearvaig Bay in Sutherland earlier this year where it was examined by the Scottish Marine Animal Stranding Scheme (SMASS) 鈥� part of 伊人直播.
The cause of death was found to be trauma associated with live stranding, most likely as a result of a severe storm.
However in a published in Mammal Communications, the online journal of the Mammal Society, researchers said it may be an indicator of wider problems in marine ecosystems.
The whale 鈥� which is the fourth beaked whale species to strand in the UK 鈥� is now in the collections of the National Museums Scotland (NMS).
Dr Andrew Kitchener, Principal Curator of Vertebrates at NMS, said: 鈥淭rue鈥檚 beaked whale is a deep-water species and like other beaked whales would be expected to strand only rarely.
鈥淲hile this discovery adds to the diversity of cetaceans we see in Britain, in recent years there have been many deaths of beaked whales, which may signify that human activities may be causing increasing problems in our wider oceans.鈥�
Dr Andrew Brownlow, head of SMASS, said: 鈥淏eaked whales are a famously difficult or 鈥榗ryptic鈥�, species to understand. Their main habitat is thought to be the deep ocean; in Scotland this is around 80 miles offshore on the continental shelf, which is not an easy place to monitor.
鈥淎t the surface, beaked whales can be difficult to spot; they are not as acrobatic or visible as many other whale or dolphin species, and hence much of the information we have on them comes from examining stranded individuals that wash up on our beaches. From this we can get an idea of distribution and identify possible threats to these otherwise quite mysterious creatures
鈥淥ur finding of a True鈥檚 beaked whale adds a fourth beaked whale species to those we have strandings records for in the UK. Although this is just one animal, it highlights the increasing diversity of species we have out in our waters and emphasises even more the need to better understand our deep ocean habitats and the impacts human activities are having on these amazing but enigmatic species.鈥�
Posted by 伊人直播 on 10/06/2020
