A new whale has been discovered in the Gulf of Mexico, but scientists warn the animal is under serious threat.
The newly identified species of baleen whale is called “Rice’s whale,” after the American biologist Dale Rice, who was the first to recognize the mammal.
Researchers at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) previously thought the whales were a subspecies of the Bryde’s whale, but the agency announced that it was actually an entirely new species in a paper published in Marine Mammal Science.
The discovery was made after examining the skull of a rice whale that washed up on a Florida beach in 2019.
Differences in the whale’s skull clearly differentiated between Rice’s whales and Byrde’s whales, which are closely related to the blue whale and the humpback whale, marine biologists said.
Rice’s whales are filter feeders that can weigh up to 60,000 pounds and grow up to 42 feet long.
Unfortunately, there are an estimated less than 100 left.
The species is listed as critically endangered under the Endangered Species Act and protected under the Marine Mammal Protection Act.
The biggest threats include ship attacks, ocean noise, energy exploration and production, oil spills, entanglement in fishing gear and ocean debris, according to the NOAA.