MIAMI, FLORIDA —
Ten whales have died and rescuers were trying to save dozens more that beached in Everglades National Park in southwest Florida, park and wildlife officials said on Wednesday.
Forty-one whales were swimming freely in shallow waters near shore as rescuers tried with little success to coax them out into deeper water. Wildlife officers euthanized four whales because they could not be saved, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA, said.
NOAA said via Twitter that survival rates typically were low in such instances.
The whales were first sighted on Tuesday afternoon in a remote part of the park near the Gulf of Mexico, according to park spokeswoman Linda Friar.
They were believed to be short-finned pilot whales, typically found in deep water in tropical and temperate areas. Biologists will perform necropsies on the dead whales to try to determine why they were stranded, NOAA said.
“Pilot whales are common stranders. They tend to do this,” Friar said. When rescued, she said, “they tend to rebeach themselves.”
“This area of the park is probably the most challenging for something like this. When the tide goes out, there's hundreds of yards of very shallow shoals,” said Friar.
Short-finned pilot whales typically travel in pods of 25 to 30 animals. Adults weigh 2,200 to 6,600 pounds [1,000 kg to 3,000 kg]), with females averaging 12 feet long [3.7 meters] and males averaging 18 feet long [5.5 meters], according to NOAA.
Forty-one whales were swimming freely in shallow waters near shore as rescuers tried with little success to coax them out into deeper water. Wildlife officers euthanized four whales because they could not be saved, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA, said.
NOAA said via Twitter that survival rates typically were low in such instances.
The whales were first sighted on Tuesday afternoon in a remote part of the park near the Gulf of Mexico, according to park spokeswoman Linda Friar.
They were believed to be short-finned pilot whales, typically found in deep water in tropical and temperate areas. Biologists will perform necropsies on the dead whales to try to determine why they were stranded, NOAA said.
“Pilot whales are common stranders. They tend to do this,” Friar said. When rescued, she said, “they tend to rebeach themselves.”
“This area of the park is probably the most challenging for something like this. When the tide goes out, there's hundreds of yards of very shallow shoals,” said Friar.
Short-finned pilot whales typically travel in pods of 25 to 30 animals. Adults weigh 2,200 to 6,600 pounds [1,000 kg to 3,000 kg]), with females averaging 12 feet long [3.7 meters] and males averaging 18 feet long [5.5 meters], according to NOAA.
