Abstract

Abstract:

Photographs of a whale initially found alive in mangroves in Pohnpei, Federated States of Micronesia (FSM), in July 2016 document the first record of the genus Kogia in the Caroline Islands. With its small size and what can be seen of its dentition, it most closely resembles a dwarf sperm whale, Kogia sima, but the possibility of it being an immature pygmy sperm whale, K. breviceps, cannot be excluded. In addition, we report the first documented record of a short-finned pilot whale, Globicephala macrorhynchus for Pohnpei State, and the first confirmed records of killer whales, Orcinus orca, and false killer whales, Pseudorca crassidens, for the FSM and the Caroline Islands, respectively.

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