A dead minke whale was observed dead in the Contrecoeur area on Thursday, learned The duty. Even if it is not possible to confirm for the moment that it is one of the two minke whales which spent several days in Montreal recently, this hypothesis is very plausible.
After spending several days swimming along Île Sainte-Hélène, the two juvenile minke whales had not been seen since May 14. One of the two stray individuals had only been observed 25 kilometers downstream from Montreal on May 15. We therefore did not know if the cetaceans were still alive, or on their way back to the St. Lawrence estuary, located more than 450 kilometers from Montreal.
Everything indicates that at least one of the two whales died. A fisherman from the Contrecoeur region photographed a dead minke whale on Thursday morning. His photo, which shows the animal floating on the surface of the water, was posted on Facebook.
Single case
The first juvenile minke whale arrived in the Montreal area around May 8. It was observed in the Le Moyne channel, between Île Sainte-Hélène and Île Notre-Dame. He then swam to another area, stubbornly staying in the area for a week.
A second minke whale was subsequently seen, also in the Le Moyne channel. The two were watched for a few days by volunteers from the Quebec Marine Mammal Emergency Network, before disappearing.
No intervention was planned to try to capture or frighten the two minke whales. There was also no information to explain their presence more than 450 kilometers from their natural habitat, the estuary and the Gulf of St. Lawrence.
However, it should be remembered that calves of this species separate from their mother after barely a few months of breastfeeding. It therefore sometimes happens that juvenile individuals go astray. In 2016, then in 2017, cases of young minke whales found dead in the Lévis region were documented.
There has never been, in the entire history of Montreal, a documented case where two whales were in the region at the same time. In the past, beluga whales have been observed in the vicinity of the metropolis, as well as the famous humpback whale which ventured there for more than a week in 2020. The latter had attracted many curious people with its many spectacular jumps out of water ; she was eventually found dead in the St. Lawrence Seaway.