Scientists dig up two-tonne whale head found on Cornwall beach in 10-hour mission
A two-tonne whale head has been pulled from the ground after a 10-hour dig on Cornwall’s Lizard Peninsula as scientists hope to commemorate and learn from the dead mammal.
A team of scientists used special vacuum excavation equipment to meticulously remove the soil over 10 hours. They had waited five years to exhume the skull of the 18-metre female fin whale, the second largest marine animal in the world, after it was found stranded on a beach in Parbean Bay and buried.
Despite efforts by experts from the British Divers Marine Life Rescue team to keep the mammal alive, the whale was found to be severely malnourished and did not survive when washed ashore. The organization said the animal had “numerous superficial wounds throughout its body” and some deeper injuries (especially around its tail) when paramedics arrived.
The whale’s two-tonne head was given by the then Duchy of Cornwall to ecologist Professor Robbie McDonald, a professor at the Institute of Environment and Sustainability at the University of Exeter.
Samples were taken from the whale’s baleen plates, which are used to sift through krill and plankton; These samples can help provide information about the whale’s living conditions before it died, which could help support long-term monitoring of marine strandings.
The ecologist then arranged for it to be buried in specially prepared soil at a research site close to the Penryn campus in Falmouth, so it could be cleaned and displayed. Over five years, organisms in the soil had extracted a bit of oil from the cleared portion of the skull. The skull is now in the final cleaning process at the research site, washed by rain and whitened by the sun.
Prof McDonald told Independent He said the whale’s stranding had a profound impact on the local community. “There were also people saying short prayers and laying flowers on it because I think people felt the death of such a magnificent animal,” he said.
“They take this seriously.”
It is not yet confirmed what will happen to the whale skull, but the possibility remains that a permanent installation will be created at the University of Exeter’s Penryn campus.
Prof McDonald said he hoped it would be a monument that would serve as “a very visual, striking, monumental reminder of marine life at risk”.
“Fin whales used to be a very abundant species,” he said. “But approximately 750,000 fin whales were killed for commercial whaling in the 20th century, and this commercial whaling did not stop in the North Atlantic until the late eighties.”
He added that there remains a chance that the skull could serve as a monument for that animal.
“We shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that this is an individual animal and it evokes a lot of emotional responses in people who see it.”
