- April 18, 2024
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Rebeccah Hazelkorn, a senior biologist with Mote, and Sgt. Bruce King with the Sarasota Police Dept. helped remove the whale from Siesta Key and get it to Mote. Photo courtesy Shelby Isaacson/Mote Marine Laboratory
Hazelkorn spoke to beachgoers about the deceased whale. Photo courtesy Shelby Isaacson/Mote Marine Laboratory
A law enforcement boat tows the whale to a boat ramp at Mote.
Officer Kenton Montegna with the Sarasota Police Department helped pull the whale into shallow water once the boat towed it in.
Officer Kenton Montegna with the Sarasota Police Department helped pull the whale into shallow water once the boat towed it in.
Researchers won't know a cause of death until after the necropsy, and even then testing may not give them a definitive answer.
The deceased pilot whale is estimated to be about 15 feet long.
Montegna helped move the whale closer to the trailer for transport onto dry land.
The pilot whale was towed to the boat ramp from Siesta Key, then was loaded into a trailer and took back to a Mote lab for further study.
Rebeccah Hazelkorn, a senior biologist, along with Sgt. Bruce King with the Sarasota Police Dept. work to get the whale on the trailer and dry land.
Officers of the Sarasota Police Department helped scientists from Mote Marine Laboratory load the beached whale into a trailer for transport. A necropsy will be performed to try to determine its cause of death.
The pilot whale was too long for the trailer, so its tail was tied with rope to keep it from dragging on the ground.
Around 11 a.m., the whale was finally removed from the water at taken back to a lab.
Bystanders and Mote employees watch the whale drive away.
A rare whale was found dead on Siesta Key before 4 this morning, washed up in the surf.
The Sheriff’s Office, working with teams at Mote Marine Laboratory, removed the whale shortly after 9 this morning. The whale's body was brought to Mote, where researchers will perform a necropsy with hopes of determining a cause of death. However, tests may not be able to provide clear answers about what happened.
"We want to hopefully figure out why the animal stranded, why it died, but in addition to that, we learn a lot of different things about it’s life history," said Gretchen Lovewell, Stranding Investigations Program Manager at Mote. While unfortunate, the stranded animal provides an opportunity for scientists to study it in a way they wouldn't be able to otherwise, she said.
The pilot whale, estimated to be about 15 feet long, is typically an animal that stays about 100 miles from the coast, in deeper waters. Mote scientists are unsure at this point what could have led to its beaching on Siesta Key, but know that it’s very rare to see any whales beach on Florida's west coast, because it's difficult to get to the depths they're so accustomed to on this part of the coast.
Lovewell said most often when pilot whales are seen on area beaches, they are not alone, as the species is prone to "mass strandings." The last stranding like that Lovewell can remember was in 2014, and more recently there was a mass stranding of killer whales in New Zealand.
"We’re on high alert right now to be sure that there aren’t other animals out there about to hit our beaches," she said. "We'll be hyper-vigilant."
If anyone sees a whale or stranded animal on a beach, Lovewell urges them to contact Mote at 941-988-0212 and not to approach the animal.
