Since 2005, southern right whale scientists have found 308 dead whales in waters along the Patagonian Coast of Argentina, according to an MSNBC report. And 90% of those deaths are calves less than 3 months old. This amounts to the singled largest die-off of great whales ever recorded.
The scary part is that the cause of the deaths is unknown. The scientific committee of the International Whaling Commission convened a special meeting in March to discuss the deaths. The most likely causes are pretty broad and may be hard to test - such as biotoxins caused by algae or other organisms (like a "red tide" event), disease, lack of prey or environmental factors at the whales' nursery grounds.
Southern right whales are large (45-55 feet long) baleen whales. Like their relatives the North Atlantic right whale and North Pacific right whales, they were subject to such intense whaling that they received protection as early as the 1930s. Unlike its northern counterparts, the southern population has recovered more quickly and its current population is estimated at over 7,000. Still, as this population is only a fraction of its historic levels, a die-off of this proportion is cause for great concern.
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Image: Southern Right Whale off South Africa, Jon Mountjoy, Flickr
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