The biggest dig: Unearthing leviathan in Canada

[OneBlueSky]

Rare whale skeleton to go on display

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2008/05/17/the_biggest_dig_unearthing_leviathan_in_canada/

NAIL POND, Prince Edward Island - In Canada's tiniest province, scientists are undertaking what may be history's largest exhumation of a single creature.

It's a whale of a tale, and a ripe one, too.

The reek from the excavation of a blue whale is strong enough to churn the stomach and bring tears streaming. It's been nearly 21 years since the immense creature washed ashore and was buried on an isolated strand of red sand near the island's northwest tip

"We're uncovering a beast bigger than any dinosaur," said Andrew Trites, biologist and leader of the effort to recover the full skeleton of the nearly forgotten cetacean and reassemble it at a new museum at the University of British Columbia, on the country's opposite shore.

"It's the length of two city buses, it held a heart the size of a Volkswagen, and a tongue about the size of an elephant," he said.

In late 2009, if all goes as scheduled, the skeleton will be suspended in a glass atrium at the Beaty Biodiversity Museum in Vancouver. It will be one of a handful of complete blue whale skeletons anywhere. Blue whales are the biggest animals on earth - and among the rarest, with only a few thousand swimming the oceans.

- more . . .

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2008/05/17/the_biggest_dig_unearthing_leviathan_in_canada/

[PetrusMonsFormicarum]

1. Smelly but cool

A famous vid clip widely available on the internet shows the results of authorities BLOWING UP a whale carcass here on Oregon's coast. Not a good idea.

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=&imgrefurl=http://www.katu.com/features/seeit/3871922.html&h=240&w=320&sz=25&hl=en&start=6&tbnid=ax-kv22rb03MRM:&tbnh=89&tbnw=118&prev=/images%3Fq%3Doregon%2Bwhale%2Bexplode%26gbv%3D2%26hl%3Den%26safe%3Doff%26sa%3DG

[bean fidhleir]

2. Buried 21 years and still stinks? What happened to the bugs and worms

that normally take much less than 21 years(!) to reduce a body to a nice clean skeleton?

[Canuckistanian]

3. There's just such a massive amount of flesh

That the normal amount of insect scavengers can't process it.

We're talking TONS of flesh here.

[depakid]

4. Not to mention, it's bloody cold

most of the year!

[bean fidhleir]

5. I'd think that would merely attract more scavengers. It's not as though anyone's

checking a no-admittance list.