The Golfo Nuevo off Argentina’s Valdés Peninsula is like a whale graveyard: according to the Argentine Whale Protection Institute (ICB), 30 whales have been stranded since September 24, including four juveniles. Everything indicates that the animals had already died in the open sea and were driven ashore by the water.
The two Swiss Renate (65) and Bruno Furer (69) encountered some dead whales in Golfo Nuevo in early October. The couple has been traveling the world in a converted truck for 20 years. The people of Bern were shocked when they saw the first whale carcass: “It was a young animal,” Renate Furer tells Blick. “Then we drove on – and on the next beach there was another dead whale!” It was then that the couple realized something was wrong. “The second dead whale sounded the alarm bells.” Finally, they even discovered a third dead animal on the peninsula.
Well fed, no injuries
The cause of the mass extinction is unclear – the results of the carcass tests have not yet been published. At least the whales were well fed and unharmed, according to the ICB.
The experts suspect that they died from an increased concentration of toxins in the sea caused by algae. In Argentina, this phenomenon is called the marea roja (red tide), because the pigment of algal blooms turns the sea surface red.
There have also been deaths in recent years
Depending on the concentration, the algal blooms can become dangerously toxic to whales. According to locals, there was an unusually high number of red tides this year. According to the researchers, the high number of deaths within a few days indicates that a local environmental factor is responsible.
Whale deaths have occurred regularly in the region in recent years. According to Mariano Sironi, scientific director of the ICB, 45 whales were found dead in 2021. Although the number is lower this season, it is worrying that the deaths have fallen in such a short time this time.