A rare specimen of dolphin of the grampus species (Grampus griseus), an adult female about 3 meters long and weighing 200 kilos, was found beached yesterday in the locality of Giannella all'Argentario (Grosseto).
This was announced by the Arpat Regional Environment Agency.
The specimen, explains a note, had already been spotted in difficulty the previous day and the harbor master's office, firefighters and volunteers from the Sea Environment Academy Association had intervened to try to save the dolphin still alive and make it resume the sea the use of a jet ski and a rescue stretcher.
Yesterday the animal was recovered dead and transported to Livorno to carry out the analysis of the carcass.
From 1986 to date, only 18 beaching events of this species have been recorded in Tuscany, the most recent in 2015. From October 2020 to the first months of the current year, numerous beached cetaceans belonging mainly to the striped dolphin species have been recovered along the Tuscan coasts and the bottlenose dolphin.
A necropsy was carried out on the carcass and the organs and tissues were sampled for pathological, parasitological, virological, bacteriological analyzes and also for the biotoxicological examination for the search for contaminants.
Stomach content analyzes will also be carried out for the study of the diet and the search for any marine litter, especially plastics.
The entire skeleton will be recovered from the Calci Museum of the University of Pisa.
It will be possible to make some hypotheses about the causes of death only when the results of the examinations performed by the vets are ready, which will take a few weeks.
(HANDLE).