In mid-2014, the waves dragged to the beach of San Jorge Island in the Bering Strait, a copy of whale belonging to the genus Berardius whose characteristics surprised and puzzled scientists: seven meters long, two pairs of teeth and a snout like dolphins.
Early research led experts to believe that it was a copy of Baird’s beaked whale, which is the largest beaked whale species. However, its 7.3 meters long the distancing of the 12 who have known copies. His yellow teeth, meanwhile, ruled out the possibility that it was a baby. In addition, your skin is darker and more flexible and larger dorsal fin published ‘National Geographic’.
Therefore, researchers face a big question found: What kind was it? After tracing the Pacific Ocean basin and analyzing DNA samples from 178 whales, they concluded that they were facing a new kind of Berardius of which, so far, only two types were known, that of Baird and of Arnoux .
researchers disconcerted
“It’s very important. The discoveries of new species of large mammals are exceptionally rare. It does not happen very often,” said Paul Wade, a biologist at the National Laboratory Administration of Marine Mammals of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA, for its acronym) US.
Meanwhile, NOAA molecular geneticist Phillip Morin, added: “We do not know how many there are or where they can find usually do not know anything, but we will start to investigate.”. Both what they should find out about this new species, researchers still saw no living specimen and even put her name yet.
