Apparently underweight whale swimming towards Paris is refusing food and seems skittish, say French authorities
French authorities were planning on Saturday to give vitamins to a beluga whale that swam way up the Seine, as they raced to save the malnourished cetacean that is refusing food.
“It’s quite emaciated and seems to be having trouble eating,” Isabelle Dorliat-Pouzet, a senior police official in the Eure department in Normandy, which is overseeing the rescue operation, told a press conference. She said that small spots had appeared on its pale skin, but that scientists hadn’t yet determined whether these were a natural occurrence because of the fresh water or signs of health difficulties.
Judging by sonar recordings, it was also emitting very few of the chirps and quicks the whales are known for, raising further concerns about the animal’s health.Belugas are normally found only in cold Arctic waters, and while they migrate south in the autumn to feed on ice forms, they rarely venture so far.It is only the second recorded sighting of a beluga in a French river since 1948, when a fisher in the estuary of the Loire river found one in his nets.
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