Rare striped dolphin stranding on Otago beach

Tuesday, 26 September 2017

A rare species of dolphin has been found washed-up on a beach near Dunedin.

The rare vagrant striped dolphin, Stenella coeruleoalba, normally lives in warm waters but one was found washed-up on Warrington Beach on Thursday.

What appears to be the same dolphin was spotted struggling in shallow water at the Doctor's Point inlet in Waitati the previous day. 

Nathan Bellingham was there and filmed as his girlfriend, Peita Fleming, guided the dolphin to deeper water. 

'It stranded twice while I was there and appeared to swim away quite happily after being rescued,' Bellingham said. 'We believed it had survived.'

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He said the dolphin had the same patters and colours as the dolphin found dead on Thursday. 

'It is very sad, especially seeing as the dolphin appeared to be in good physical shape and had no clear sign of injury.'

Jim Fyfe, from the Department of Conservation, said it was the most southern stranding of the warm-water species to be recorded.

The species was commonly found in the Pacific, Indian and Atlantic Oceans.

The dead dolphin was taken to Otago Museum for a stranding report to be completed, which included identifying its sex, recording measurements, and collecting a skin sample for the New Zealand Cetacean Tissue Archive at Auckland University

The male dolphin had no obvious external signs of injury that could have led to its death.

Massey University (Auckland) marine biologist Dr Karen Stokin will travel to Dunedin later this year to carry out a post-mortem investigation.

Stokin has studied striped dolphins from stranding deaths around the North Island for over 10 years.