A Sowerby’s beaked whale has died after stranding in Gloucester, Massachusetts, and may have been infected with avian influenza.
According to the New Yorker Radio Hour (https://www.nhpr.org/nh-news/2023-05-25/a-unique-whale-species-washed-up-in-new-england-giving-a-rare-glimpse-of-a-deep-sea-diver), washed ashore on Wingaersheek Beach in Gloucester, Mass.
Brian Yurasits, part of the Marine Mammal Rescue team based at the Seacoast Science Center in Rye, was one of the first on the scene. “It was alive when it initially stranded, and was noted to be somewhat lethargic, but still thrashing occasionally,” he said.
No one from the response crew, which included teams from NOAA and the International Fund for Animal Welfare from Cape Cod had ever seen this particular animal.
Experts identified the 13.8-foot-long (4.2 meters) animal as a juvenile female Sowerby’s beaked whale (Mesoplodon bidens) — one of the “deepest diving animals in the ocean,” Yurasits said, reports Live Science (https://www.livescience.com/animals/whales/ultra-rare-deep-diving-whale-dies-on-new-england-beach-with-possible-case-of-bird-flu).
“These animals have a large melon on their head,” said Yurasits. “They have a very long beak and actually no teeth that are visible. So, almost similar to a mix between a whale and a dolphin.”
“[Sowerby’s beaked whales] spend most of their time off of the continental shelf of the North Atlantic,” Yurasits said. “You would never expect to see these things near shore, let alone in a few feet of water.”
The whale died just a few hours later and the SSC team called scientists at the University of New Hampshire to the scene for a full animal autopsy, known as a necropsy.
The results indicated that the beaked whale had a viral infection that caused its brain to become inflamed and swollen. “The degree of inflammation explains the death of this animal, as well as why it might have been disoriented and strayed into shallow waters,” said Inga Sidor (https://colsa.unh.edu/person/inga-sidor), a senior veterinary pathologist at the New Hampshire Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory and lead veterinary pathologist on the necropsy.
In an email to Live Science, Sidor said they are still testing the animal’s cerebral tissue to determine which virus caused the infection, but “avian influenza is a top consideration.”
Only a very small number of cetaceans have been diagnosed with avian influenza, or bird flu, so “it’ll be a big deal (at least in the marine mammal world) if it does turn out to be influenza,” she added.
