21 Dead Dolphins Wash Up on New Jersey Beaches

August 2,2013

A bottlenose dolphin. (Comstock Images/Thinkstock)

TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — New Jersey environmental officials are offering the state’s assistance in determining what’s behind an apparently high number of dolphin deaths over the past several weeks.
The state Division of Fish and Wildlife is working with the nonprofit Marine Mammal Stranding Center in Brigantine.
It has offered the use of conservation officers and state boats to recover dead or dying dolphins.
State officials said Thursday it appears the deaths are part of a natural disease cycle and not related to water quality, which they say has been high this summer.
The Marine Mammal Stranding Center has responded to 21 dolphin deaths along the New Jersey coast since July 9, the state said. Necropsies have so far confirmed four died of pneumonia.
The dead or dying dolphins, of varying sizes and ages, were found on or near beaches from Monmouth County to Cape May County.
Morbillivirus, a naturally occurring virus linked to the deaths of 90 dolphins in 1987 off New Jersey, has been confirmed in one of the recovered dolphins, state officials said. Results are pending on others.
Federal officials are also looking into the apparently larger-than-normal number of dolphin deaths occurring in New Jersey as well as other mid-Atlantic states, though it is not known if there is any connection, New Jersey officials said.
The public is advised not to approach dead or dying dolphins.