The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife is helping investigate the entanglement of a young humpback whale stranded earlier this week near Yachats.
The humpback whale that washed ashore on the Central Oregon coastline after getting tangled in crabbing gear was euthanized after a group of volunteers were unable to get it back into the ocean, officials said.
The decision to euthanize the whale was made after a failed attempt to reorient and tow it back to sea.
The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife said this is an example of a broader issue of marine mammal entanglement in fishing gear.
ODFW says they have been continuing to work with Oregon’s Crab Fleet to reduce the risk of entanglement, as well as looking into changing crabbing regulations.
“We are exploring new regulations that would allow an experimental permit to use experimental fishing gear. So instead of having on crab rope for every single crab pot, we can find alternative ways to string those in a long line so it would reduce the number of lines in the water to reduce whale entanglement, ” said Marine Resources Program Manager, Justin Ainsworth.
Ainsworth says ODFW plans on testing out the different fishing gear this summer to see what could help, but official changes to crabbing regulations wouldn’t be seen until 20-27.