![\"Map](\"https:\/\/hakaimagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/map-whale-necropsy.png\")
<\/a>Map data by OpenStreetMap via ArcGIS<\/p><\/div>\n
Raverty wipes sweat from his face, takes a tug of water, and sharpens a fillet-style, 25-centimeter forensic knife\u2014the same type used on human cadavers. He puts on gumboots and waterproof bib overalls, which are incinerated after about every third necropsy. \u201cThey just get a little too aromatic.\u201d<\/p>\n
Raverty conducts a methodical walk around the carcass to assess the breadth of the task ahead and to look for obvious clues to cause of death. I poke the carcass with my finger and it bounces back, like the hull of a rubberized, inflatable craft.<\/p>\n
This whale fetched up on its back during its northerly spring migration, eyes pressed against the sand, and furrowed belly with 25 ventral grooves pointing skyward. These grooves stretch like an accordion during feeding, allowing the whale to open its jaw to take in vast amounts of seawater. The baleen inside the mouth then acts like a filter to capture prey, typically schools of small fish and krill.<\/p>\n
Raverty\u2019s eyes follow the symmetry of the carcass, looking for abnormalities in alignment of the bones or unusual coloring that might suggest a lack of nutrition or injury. Dilation of the throat in this case hints at more findings to come.<\/p>\n
Since the team can\u2019t flip the hulking whale over, the back of the animal, including the top side of its spinal column, is largely inaccessible during the necropsy. Rising tides, the challenging access, and a small necropsy team also hinder a fuller skeletal examination.<\/p>\n
The whale is pockmarked with beak bites from scavenging bald eagles\u2014now relegated to the shoreline trees, their squeaky-door calls imploring Raverty to get on with it.<\/p>\n
The whale\u2019s tongue is a gooey grayish blob protruding from the mouth. Raverty looks inside for foreign debris such as plastics or fishing gear, or evidence of damage to the baleen, but finds none. Black skin peels from the tail flukes, which are tied to a tree with close to 50 meters of rope to prevent the tides from returning the carcass to the dark abyss.<\/p>\n
Raverty leans over for a closer inspection of the pectoral fins on the sides of the whale\u2014white on the bottom, dark on top, and mottled with freeloading barnacles. He observes scar lines near the base of each fin, suggesting the whale may have encountered fishing gear at some point in its life. \u201cThose are the types of things we\u2019re looking for, evidence of human interaction,\u201d he explains.<\/p>\n
<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\tThere\u2019s more than idle curiosity at stake today. The necropsy results will form part of a baseline of information on the overall health of the humpback population\u2014estimated at 20,000 or more in the North Pacific\u2014and could potentially point to problems such as entanglement with fishing gear or ship strikes that humans are in a position to tackle.<\/p>\n
Raverty emphasizes that the necropsy is just one part of the investigation. He relies upon a host of other experts\u2014lab technicians to analyze tissue samples, biologists, ecologists, oceanographers, and climate-change specialists\u2014whose findings will later contribute to a broader understanding of why marine mammals die. Half the time, necropsies do not determine cause of death. \u201cEach is a unique challenge, a learning process,\u201d he explains. \u201cIt provides a glimpse into the natural history of these animals.\u201d<\/p>\n
Despite his international reputation for necropsies on marine life, Raverty remains surprisingly modest\u2014soft spoken and polite, too. He has performed some 2,200 necropsies of marine mammals from across North America over the past two decades\u2014not just of humpbacks, but killer, gray, fin and beluga whales, as well as seals and sea lions, porpoises, dolphins, and sea otters. About 20 percent of the necropsies are conducted in the field\u2014generally on the whales, which are too big for transport\u2014and the remainder are done in his lab under more controlled conditions with better equipment and technical support.<\/p>\n
DFO technically owns the carcass and issues permits to allow Raverty to take tissue samples for research purposes and to better inform federal management of marine mammals. It is not unusual for him to work for free on his own time, such is his devotion to the job. \u201cI basically hold his tools,\u201d jokes Cottrell, who is Raverty\u2019s right-hand man during such procedures. He also takes notes of the veterinary pathologist\u2019s verbal findings as the necropsy unfolds.<\/p>\n
Cottrell and Lehnhart, wearing disposable white Tyvek protective coveralls sealed with duct tape at the ankles, also help by taking measurements of today\u2019s whale. The length is 7.82 meters, suggesting a juvenile about two years old.<\/p>\n
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With the preliminary inspection over, it\u2019s time to start slicing.<\/p>\n
Raverty and Lehnhart use their knives to carve off heavy rectangular chunks of blubber and skeletal muscle to access the internal organs. Cottrell wields a flensing knife close to two meters long befitting a gladiator in Rome\u2019s ancient Colosseum.<\/p>\n
Thick blubber suggests the young humpback had been getting plenty of food. In contrast, at least 208 gray whales\u2014many of them emaciated\u2014have washed ashore this year on the west coast of North America, from Mexico to Alaska. The poor condition could be a sign that the estimated population of 27,000 gray whales is at carrying capacity in the eastern North Pacific or that 2018 conditions in the Bering Strait provided insufficient food for the whales prior to their southerly migration.<\/p>\n
This humpback carcass has been rotting away for perhaps a week, including the time before it washed ashore. With the exterior blubber removed, Raverty plunges his knife deep into the whale\u2019s side, releasing a putrid stream of dissolved blubber. \u201cWith the heat, it just liquefies,\u201d he explains.<\/p>\n
<\/a>Paul Cottrell, foreground, and Taylor Lehnhart from Fisheries and Oceans Canada use flensing knives to cut away the blubber and skeletal muscle from the whale\u2019s torso. Photo by Josh Silberg<\/p><\/div>\n
The smell is uniquely repulsive, certain to linger for hours in our nasal passages. Keith Jordan, a maintenance worker integral to the Hakai Institute\u2019s operations on the island, watches the necropsy unfold from a distance and recoils with disgust. \u201cThat\u2019s unreal,\u201d he says, hand over his face. Raverty has toughened up over the years. \u201cI can\u2019t smell it anymore,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019ve gotten used to it, I guess.\u201d<\/p>\n
Noxious gases emitted from a bloated whale carcass can almost make a person pass out. The internal pressure is also extreme, putting the necropsy team in the spray zone. For Raverty, it all comes with the territory. \u201cI\u2019ve seen him get it a few times, but he keeps coming back for more,\u201d Cottrell remarks with a smile.<\/p>\n
Raverty pushes the knife ever deeper and his black gloves become lost in the gooey entrails. The mystery of this humpback only deepens, too. The gonads and the internal organs, including the liver, heart, intestines, and kidney, have shifted from the abdominal cavity to the throat and chest. There are two potential explanations for the rearrangement: blunt-force trauma, or the extreme buildup of internal pressure after death. Over the years, Raverty has observed the bizarre effects of internal gas buildup, including stomachs of bloated whales extruding from the mouth, or the rectum from the anus.<\/p>\n
As the hacking and tearing continues, Raverty proceeds past the ribs to expose the heart and lungs, which resemble a big slab of corned beef. One rib protrudes from the body like a piece of driftwood, next to coils of large intestines as thick as Raverty\u2019s forearms and measuring perhaps 10 meters in length.<\/p>\n
He announces he\u2019s found part of the penis and the corpus cavernosum, which contains most of the blood during an erection. He sees the urinary bladder, too, but it\u2019s empty, lacking the urine he typically samples to screen for indication of muscle injury, harmful algal toxins, and faulty kidney function.<\/p>\n
At 2:20\u00a0p.m., it\u2019s lunchtime\u2014and, yes, sushi is off the menu. We dine on sprout sandwiches, cookies, and apples. \u201cI\u2019ve tried bowhead whale meat,\u201d Lehnhart offers up as small talk. \u201cIt\u2019s not very good.\u201d<\/p>\n