The Environment services of the Cabildo of Fuerteventura have proceeded to remove the carcass of a sperm whale (Physeter macrocephalus), which was located early this Tuesday in Corralejo, on some rocks. The "juvenile" specimen was about 4.5 meters long, according to the Fauna department of the Cabildo of Fuerteventura.
The animal's body had been monitored in recent days. It was spotted for the first time on Monday and later Maritime Rescue located it in the high seas, in waters located between the island of Lobos and Lanzarote. The Environment agents have been in charge of monitoring the north coast of Fuerteventura for the last two days to try to locate the carcass in case it touched land. Finally, the lifeless body of this sperm whale was found this Tuesday, during high tide.
"The coordination and participation of the different Security and Emergency devices has been fundamental in recent hours. Given the large size of the animal, it was necessary to control its position to prevent it from affecting navigation in an area where regular maritime lines operate connecting Lanzarote with Fuerteventura. Therefore, there was a certain risk of collision", explained the Councilor for the Environment of the Cabildo, Natalia Évora.
Environment proceeded to remove the animal at 11:15 this Tuesday. For this, it had to use a crane truck from the Cabildo's own Council. The carcass, whose weight has been estimated at about 4,000 kilograms, has been transferred to the Biological Station of La Oliva, where a veterinary team specifically moved from the University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria will proceed to perform the necropsy of the specimen. In this way, it will try to clarify the causes of its death.
Necropsy and recovery of the skeleton
Once the necropsy has been performed, directed by the professor of the Veterinary Faculty of the ULPGC, Manuel Arbelo, the animal's carcass will be partially dismembered and buried in the grounds of the Biological Station of La Oliva itself. The objective of the Cabildo with this measure is to recover the skeleton of the sperm whale for its future public exhibition at some point in the geography of Fuerteventura, within the dissemination project called La Senda de Los Cetáceos.
Although the exact data will not be known until after the necropsy and tissue analysis performed on the carcass, it is estimated that the sperm whale could have been dead for about two weeks, given the state of decomposition of the body. According to a first visual examination, the carcass did not present any evidence that could determine the cause of death, only bite marks from fish of a certain size, in any case post mortem.
