n November 1990, students and faculty took on a project of preparing and mounting the skeleton of a Gray whale that had been found floating near shore, dead in the Strait of Juan de Fuca, West of Race Rocks.

Even after retrieving the bones to the docks, they had to sit for some time and many students helped in the slow and arduous task of removing the last bits of connective tissues that clung to the bones. While the decomposing remains were anchored to the shore, two large vertebrae were removed by some fishermen. They were traced and eventually recovered but they show up now as slightly yellowed and cleaner. (Probably from the bleach used to clean them.)

Finger mould

The Fiberglass finger bone on the left hand was made from the one on the right hand. This task took some time as the liquid rubber had to be painted on in many layers, each being allowed to dry. The final results are visible as slightly white looking fiberglass replacements on the skeleton. The largest bone that we lost was in the neck region. A concrete replacement was made for it from the clay replica moulded by Siegmar Zacharias . At this time Sylvia Roach became the faculty contact for the group of six students working on the whale as an activity. The work progressed slowly during the fall as the process of getting all the bones cleaned and then sealed was a demanding one. In the second term, two students, Jody Snowden and Becky Macoun persisted and contributed many hours of time to see it through the final stages of mounting. They also assisted Gary Stonely with the welding, cutting, polishing and painting of the metal parts.

Our former administrator, the late John Davis was instrumental in promoting the project. In addition to taking the photographs in the display case, he was responsible for securing a grant of $5000 from the Ministry of Advanced Education of the Province of British Columbia to enable us to complete the project.

Two species of Arthropod lived parasitically on the whale’s skin. The Gray Whale barnacle, Cryptolepas rachianecti .  Also, The Gray Whale Lice Cyamus kessleri was located on the skin.

THE MOUNTED GRAY WHALE SKELETON AT PEARSON COLLEGE

Gray Whale Skeleton , Eschristius robusta at Lester B. Pearson College.. (with Alex Fletcher)

INGI FINNSON (PC-Year 25) took this series of closeup photos for a project being done by a scientific artist:

Title: Taxonomy of the gray whale

Description:
Gray whales have mottled gray skin which sometimes seems to look slate-blue or marbled white and its head arches between its blowhole and snout – grey whales have relatively small heads. They don’t have a dorsal fin; instead there is a low hump with between 6 and 12 knuckles between the hump and the tail. Their flippers are small and paddle-shaped. Their baleen plates are about 50cm in length. Gray whales have what look like yellow spots on their skin, these are, in fact, small parasitic crustaceans. Many cetaceans are infested with these although not always the same type – some parasites live on only one type of whale. The gray whale is more heavily infested with a greater variety than any other cetacean. They do not seem to harm the whale in any way although when they leave the whale’s skin in warmer waters it still shows the scar.
Yankee whalers named the gray whales “devilfish” because they were so protective of their young when approached, often charging or attacking whalers. Today, they are better known for being not only one of the most active of the large whales but also one of the most inquisitive and friendly.

• The scientific order Cetacea includes all whales. This large order is further divided into three suborders: the toothed whales or Odontoceti (killer whales, dolphins, porpoises, beluga whales, and sperm whales), the baleen whales or Mysticeti (blue whales, humpback whales, gray whales and right whales), and the Archaeoceti (which are all now extinct).
• The word “cetacean” is derived from the Greek word cetus, which means whale.
Suborder–Mysticeti.
• The term “baleen whale” is another name for the scientific suborder Mysticeti.
• The word Mysticeti is derived from the Greek word for moustache, mystax. It may refer to the hairy appearance of the baleen plates, which baleen whales have instead of teeth. Baleen whales have two external blowholes and are larger in size than most toothed whales.
• Baleen whales are sometimes referred to as the “great whales.”
Family– Eschrichtiidae
• This family has one living member, the gray whale. The gray whale has a few throat grooves, short baleen plates, and a small dorsal hump followed by a series of bumps.
Trophic level:
Because of their relative size, gray whales are usually at the top of the food chain:
Main danger to whales:
Ed note : since this was written , there is a greater recognition now of the danger to whales by ship strikes and ship casued noise in the seascape which interferes with the whales echolocation
• Whalers, who kill whales to sell their meat.• Human activities such as pollution. Currently( 2006, both Japan and Norway still pursue whales ( Minke and others) under the guise of scientific whaling. Japan harvests several hundreds from the waters of the Antarctic, and Norway gets theirs from the North Sea.

(Chinyere Amadi PC Yr 31  2005)

Return to the Race Rocks Taxonomy and Image File

The Race Rocks taxonomy is a collaborative venture originally started with the Biology and Environmental Systems students of Lester Pearson College UWC. It now also has contributions added by Faculty, Staff, Volunteers and Observers on the remote control webcams.