Rescuers fail to save beached minke whale
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A MINKE whale lost her fight for life after stranding on a pebbled beach on the outskirts of Ardersier, despite a frantic effort by rescuers using torchlight.
The 6m long juvenile, described as scrawny-looking and possibly diseased, was seen circling close to shore before coming to rest against an offshore sewage pipe and then washing right into the shallows at high tide and dying on the beach.
British Divers Marine Life Rescue (BDMLR) volunteer Martin Boon said it was "devastating," but the team had full confidence that everything possible had been done to save it.
He said: "The breathing slowed and then it stopped and sadly it passed away on the beach.
"We did as much as we could do."
Soldiers at Fort George were also drafted in to hep and it was hoped that the whale could be transported to the Scottish Marine Animal Stranding Scheme’s (SMASS) Inverness lab, where a necropsy could be carried out.
The whale, believed to be about two years old, stranded at Ardersier at about 7.45pm on Tuesday.
The alarm was raised by a concerned member of the public who saw it circling the bay dangerously close to the water’s edge.
This sparked a rescue effort from a 13-strong team of volunteer marine mammal medics from the BDMLR. The Inverness Coastguard was also called out.
Mr Boon said rescuers initially mistakenly thought that the mammal was entangled.
It managed to refloat itself on the rising tide but then stranded itself a bit further out, up against a barnacle-encrusted sewage pipe.
Rescuers waded into the water to wrap it in sheets and blankets in a bid to protect it from injury and a pontoon was placed underneath the mammal to try to stop it from stranding on the beach.
But the effort proved fruitless and the whale was pronounced dead a short while later.
Mariel Pen Doeschate, a data analyst for SMASS, said it was unusual for a minke whale to strand on a beach on this coastline.
The only other occurrences she knew of were in the Fife area.
Ms Pen Doeschate said an initial health check ruled out death by entanglement but revealed that the whale was thin and malnourished.
She said: "She’s not looking in the best of condition. She is probably diseased. We will do a full examination and collect all the samples which will give us a lot of information about the health of the living population."
She added: "She won’t go to waste. We have about four minke whale per year that are fresh enough for us to examine. This is quite a rare chance for us to gather a lot of valuable information."
