VANCOUVER — A dead killer whale calf has been found floating near Sooke, B.C.
The federal fisheries department received reports Thursday about a whale's body floating near the Vancouver Island community.
A search began and officials found the animal's body Friday morning, about 500 metres from the shore.
Paul Cottrell with the fisheries department says a lot of the young female whale's skin is gone, which shows that it has been floating for some time.
The animal's body is now being transported to Vancouver for a necropsy which could help determine how it died and which pod it came from.
There has been a baby boom among B.C. whales over the last year, and Cottrell says they do not yet know whether the dead calf is one of the recent newborns.
