A beached whale is not necessarily unusual for the Oregon Parks and Recreation Department, but the agency has had its hands full since a 34-foot juvenile humpback whale washed ashore at Nehalem Bay State Park on Memorial Day.
While the whale, which was likely killed by a boat strike, continues to rot on the north coast beach, park officials have been busy shooting down Facebook rumors and fending off visitors who have been straying into restricted areas.
On Wednesday, the parks department posted to Facebook clarifying that it has no plans to blow up the whale carcass, citing a post making the rounds that claimed otherwise. Detonation comes up practically every time there’s a beached cetacean in Oregon, as people relive the infamous exploding whale incident of 1970.
“History isn’t repeating itself,” the parks department wrote on Facebook. “It isn’t happening.”
These days, officials typically leave whale carcasses to rot naturally on the beach, allowing the bodies to be utilized by the other creatures of the local ecosystem. Park officials on Wednesday said that after more than a week, natural decomposition has “left nothing but an unrecognizable blob and a horrible stench.”
“Our guess is no one wants to see it or smell it,” they added.
That hasn’t stopped people from trying.
Parks spokesperson Stefanie Knowlton said the park has been inundated with visitors hoping to get a glimpse of the whale, with many people disregarding boundaries put in place to protect the sensitive snowy plover habitat nearby.
Nehalem Bay is just one of many coastal parks that have areas roped off seasonally to protect snowy plover nesting spots. In those areas, the parks department restricts activities like riding bikes, flying kits and drones, or walking dogs, even on leash.
The western snowy plover has been listed as a threatened species since 1993, as population numbers declined due to human disturbance, urban development and the introduction of nonnative species.
“We have visitors walking through the sensitive area, riding bikes and e-bikes through it and even allowing dogs, both on and off leash, to cross it,” Knowlton said. “We’re encouraging visitors to stay out of the area. The necropsy was conducted last week so there is not much of the whale to see at this point."
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