"Biologists Try To Figure Out Northern California Whale Deaths"

"The foul-smelling carcasses of whales are attracting a veritable swarm of marine biologists to California beaches in what has so far been a futile effort to figure out why so many of the blubbery beasts are washing ashore.

Twelve dead whales, including grays, a humpback and a sperm whale, have been documented in Northern California since March. That includes a badly decomposed and headless whale found Tuesday on South Beach along the Point Reyes National Seashore, officials with the Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary confirmed.

The latest leviathan, an unidentified species, rolled in with the surf days after a 28-foot juvenile gray whale washed up Saturday on Portuguese Beach along the Sonoma Coast. On May 19, a gray whale washed up in Half Moon Bay just as officials in Pacifica were burying two recently beached whales — a humpback and a sperm."

Peter Fimrite reports for the San Francisco Chronicle May 26, 2015.