| Longman’s Beaked Whale (Indopacetus pacificus), also known as the Indo-Pacific Beaked Whale and the Tropical Bottlenose Whale, was considered to be the world’s rarest cetacean until recently, but the Spade Toothed Whale now holds that position. The species has had a long history riddled with misidentifications, which are now mostly resolved. A skull found in Mackay, Queensland, Australia provided the initial description, but some authorities insisted on classifying it was a True's Beaked Whale or a female Bottlenose Whale instead of a new species. A whale washed up near Danae, Somalia in 1955 was processed into fertilizer with only the skull remaining, and biologist Joseph C. Moore used it to effectively demonstrate that it was a unique species. However, there was a considerable debate as to whether the whale belonged in the genus Mesoplodon or not. The next major development happened when a paper, available here, had shown that there were actually six remains of the whale, including a complete female with a fetus found in the Maldives in 2000. The other remains consisted of a skull from Kenya in 1968, and two juveniles from South Africa in 1976 and 1992 respectively. The paper used DNA analysis to show that Longman’s Beaked Whale is likely to be an independent genus, but information on other species was too lacking to establish any concrete phylogeny. The external physical appearance was also revealed, and a firm connection was established with the mysterious Tropical Bottlenose Whales sighted in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. During the publication of the paper, a specimen originally identified as a Giant Beaked Whale washed up in Kagoshima, Japan in July 2002. Another specimen claimed to be a Longman’s Beaked Whale which washed up in South Africa in August 2002 is likely a misidentified Cuvier's Beaked Whale. |
