Minke whale remains wash up in Pownal Bay
Wildlife pathologist with the Atlantic Veterinary College says he sees two or three every year
A dead minke whale was found Tuesday on the banks of Pownal Bay in Cherry Valley in eastern PEI. While wildlife officials are still investigating how the whale landed in the bay, they say it could be used as an opportunity to prepare for stranded whales in the future.
The Canadian Wildlife Health Cooperative and provincial wildlife officials attended the scene Thursday to try to figure out how the whale ended up on shore. Chuck Gallison with PEI's Forests, Fish and Wildlife was one of the first to discover the remains.
"This is, well up inside a marsh inside a point... but we had strong tides and things like that and the wind and all those things play a part of where they wash ashore,” he said.
The whale is almost five metres long and about a year old, according to Pierre Daoust, a wildlife pathologist with the Atlantic Veterinary College in Charlottetown. He said the death is so far a mystery.
"Because it's young it's quite possible it would have stranded by mishap; that is, if it was separated from its group then it got lost essentially,” he said.
Daoust said it`s not uncommon for whales to wash up on shore. He sees at least one or two per year, sometimes alive. Daoust is working on guidelines on how to humanely euthanize beached whales.
"A large animal like this, once it has stranded, once it has spent any amount of time on shore, it's future prospect for surviving are very low,” he explained. “Quite often from a humane perspective it's much preferable to euthanize them rather than letting them suffer for hours if not days.