May 2, 2023 – Are there whales in Croatia? Indeed. An almost unreal video was taken near the island of Vis, where a dozen whales were filmed. These were fin whales headed from the direction of Lastovo towards Barjaci. It is a species protected by law and on the list of endangered species.
Draško Holcer from the Blue World Institute, senior curator of the Croatian Museum of Natural History, explained for N1, as reported by 24Sata, that this is the only species found in the Mediterranean.
“It is a species that uses the entire Mediterranean area; they feed there, circle it in search of food, and appear at different times of the year where their food can be found. They enter the Adriatic mainly in the spring because, in the area of the Jabuka basin, a larger amount of small planktonic shrimp appear on which they feed, and that is when we most often record their appearance in the Adriatic”, said Holcer.
He added that people perceive this species as special, specific, and strange because these animals mostly stick to the open sea and cannot be seen from land, in canals, etc.
“Fin whales in the Adriatic are not animals that have gone astray, following ships or something similar. They are animals for which the Adriatic is part of their normal habitat and where they appear during feeding time”, said Holcer.
The fin whale is the second largest animal on earth. Holcer says they are an endangered species in the Mediterranean Sea.
“The estimated number of adults is only a little more than 1,700, so their number is minimal”, said Holcer.
He also discovered that this species in the Mediterranean Sea has one specificity.
“Although the fin whale is a species that inhabits all the seas and oceans of the world, individuals in the Mediterranean Sea are genetically different from their closest relatives in the Atlantic. Therefore, it can be said that they are purely Mediterranean animals. They don’t migrate outside that area”, he added.
He pointed out that the biggest problem for fin whales in the Mediterranean is that it is one of the busiest areas in the world.
“A lot of shipping traffic takes place here. Collisions with ships are one of the most common reasons for the death of these animals. More than 20 percent of dead animals stranded on the coast of France were killed precisely because of collisions with vessels. A few years ago, there was a case where we saw two whales near Lošinj, one of which had cuts on its back from a large propeller”, warned Holcer.
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