Nearly two dozen gray whales have already died of strandings this year on Northwest beaches

Nearly two dozen gray whales have already died of strandings this year on Northwest beaches.

A staggering 22 gray whales have been found dead this year on the coast of Washington and along the state’s Puget Sound, King 5 News reported Monday.

Gray whales are under “sensitive” status in Washington, which means the native mammals are “vulnerable or declining” and likely to become endangered or threatened in the state, according to the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.

As recently as last Wednesday, a male gray whale was found near Bremerton, King 5 News reported, citing fish and wildlife officials.

“We've been seeing record numbers of gray whales washing up dead, what we call a stranding,” Cascadia Research Collective founder and research biologist John Calambokitis previously told the outlet.

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Malnutrition was the most common finding in whales examined this year, the outlet reported, citing experts with Cascadia Research Collective and NOAA Fisheries.

Experts believe climate change in the Arctic, where the whales migrate to feed, is reducing their prey.

“A combination of increasing ocean acidity, increasing ocean temperatures, and other changing oceanographic patterns could lead to declines in the small benthic invertebrates that gray whales feed on … as well as disrupt the timing and distribution of prey,” the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife writes on its website.

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Last Wednesday, NOAA Fisheries West Coast posted a community alert on Facebook warning of one to two malnourished gray whales spotted in Central Puget Sound.

The male gray whale found near Bremerton that day showed signs of malnutrition and blunt force trauma, King 5 News reported.

Gray whales in the North Pacific are divided into two populations — the Eastern North Pacific and Western North Pacific stocks.

There were about 26,960 whales in the Eastern North Pacific stock in 2016, fish and wildlife officials said.

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The Western North Pacific stock, which is federally endangered, numbered about 271 to 311 whales in 2016.

Fish and wildlife officials said that aside from climate change, gray whales also face threats of “entanglement in fishing gear and marine debris”, ship strikes and “human-generated marine sound.”

At least four whales that washed up dead in Washington this year showed injuries believed to be caused by ship strikes, and one showed signs of a recent entanglement, according to King 5 News.

In 2019, Washington documented 35 gray whale strandings, the outlet reported, noting that researchers said this year’s total has already surpassed the number of strandings at the same point in that record-breaking year.

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