Humpback whale carcass washes up on Haida Gwaii beach
A dead humpback whale, identified by researchers as being an 18-year-old female known as Kayak, was discovered on a Haida Gwaii beach on Saturday.
The Marine Education and Research Society, a non-profit marine conservation organization, said the whale's carcass was discovered near the mouth of the Tlell River on Graham Island.
In Facebook post, MERS said the cause of death has not been determined but 18 years is a relatively young age for a humpback.
“We don't know life expectancy for humpbacks off our coast as they have not been studied long enough as individuals. It is estimated that they can likely live to at least age 80,” the Facebook post said. “If a necropsy is done, it could reveal if there was blunt force trauma from collision, or an infection, and/or if she was pregnant. But it could be that she is too decayed for a necropsy to lead to any useful observations.”
The whale, known as BCX0977 to researchers, was nicknamed Kayak because of a distinctive marking on the upper right side its tale that resembles a person in a kayak.
Kayak was often seen around northeast Vancouver Island but was also known to travel to Alaska, the central B.C. coast, the Salish Sea and down to southwest Vancouver Island.
The humpback whale, a migratory species that feeds in the North Pacific from spring through fall before returning to its breeding grounds in Mexico and Hawaii during the winter months, has been labelled a species of special concern.
A 2006 study estimated that there were about 1,800 of the whales swimming B.C. waters but Fisheries and Oceans Canada says the population has grown since then.
“Following depletion by commercial whaling, the number of humpback whales continues to increase and their distribution has been expanding over the last ten years,” the DFO said.
A 2011 report by the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada pegged the annual population growth of the B.C. humpbacks at 4.1 per cent.
Last May, multiple humpback sightings in Vancouver Harbour were viewed as a welcome sign of recovery by marine biologists.
“It took 100 years for them to come back,” Andrew Trites, a professor at the Institute for the Oceans and Fisheries at the University of B.C., said.