People should not approach a huge dead fin whale that has washed up on a beach on the Mizen peninsula in west Cork due to uncertainty around the cause of death, an expert has warned.
Stephanie Levesque of the Irish Whale and Dolphin Group (IWDG) said the animal, which washed up in the Barleycove area, was a female fin whale.
It is the second largest mammal in the world and can grow up to 25m, weigh about 48 tonnes and live up to 90 years.
“The whale clearly has been dead for a while – it’s very decomposed because there isn’t much of the head left and you can see from the tail that there are bite marks which are probably from sharks, so it’s definitely been scavenged,” said Ms Levesque.
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IDWG stranding group volunteers Jasmine Stavenow Jerremalm and Jan Wolstenholme examined the whale – a female measuring about 17.5m (57.4ft), although that is an estimate because of the amount of decomposition at either end.
“With fin whales we normally get one or two a year being washed ashore, so it’s not out of the ordinary, but with that level of decomposition and without a postmortem, we can’t say how this one died. But it was definitely scavenged at sea and washed in.”
Disposal of the whale carcass is the responsibility of the local authority, although it was unclear on Thursday afternoon what plans Cork County Council had for disposing of the Barleycove whale.
However, Ms Levesque said the size of the whale carcass meant removal would be difficult so it was likely the council would look at disposing of the remains by burying the animal close to where it was washed up.
“We are often contacted by local authorities about what they should do to dispose of a whale so we recommend burial above the high tide line so it can’t be uncovered again, so if it isn’t washed back out to sea, that is probably what they will do,” she said.
“In the meanwhile, we would urge people not to go to close to the remains but to keep their distance because we don’t know what she died from and of course we would urge anyone who comes across any stranded whales or dolphins to contact us as soon as possible.”
