AVALON, N.J. (KYW Newsradio) — A post-mortem examination is planned for Wednesday, for a dead dolphin that washed ashore in Avalon Monday.
Volunteers from the Marine Mammal Stranding Center in Brigantine successfully rescued a seal pup that found its way onto Route 35 near Curtis Point Drive in Brick Township late Monday afternoon, when they received a call that a dolphin washed up along the beach near 50th Street in Avalon.
“This is a bottlenose dolphin, probably an offshore species, and he is about 8 feet long, he is a few hundred pounds,” described Sheila Dean, director of the stranding center. She explained there were no visible puncture wounds or cuts on the dolphin.
A team is being assembled to perform a necropsy Wednesday, on the beach in Brigantine.
“They are coming from the MERR Institute in Delaware, some veterinarians and some of our volunteers who help us with the whale necropsies,” said Dean. “The city of Brigantine is going to help us with that as well.”
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This is the fourth dead dolphin found in New Jersey in about a week and a half. The cause of each death has yet to be determined.
Over the past few months, more than a dozen dead whales have washed up along the New Jersey and New York coasts. The latest was a dead humpback whale found Monday, in a shipping channel between New Jersey and New York.
Many experts say ship strikes are the likely cause of death for the majority of the whales.