THE carcass of what was thought to be a mysterious sea creature that washed ashore Membedai beach here on Wednesday has been confirmed to be that of a female Irrawaddy dolphin.

Labuan Fisheries Department director Faizal Ibrahim Suhaili said a fisheries researcher from Rantau Abang, Terengganu, confirmed that the dolphin, with the scientific name of Orcaella brevirostris, is a euryhaline species of oceanic dolphin found in discontinuous subpopulations near sea coasts and in estuaries and rivers in parts of Penang, several parts of the peninsula, and Sabah and Sarawak.

He said the 2.5m-long, 80kg dolphin had been dead for more than 72 hours on the day it was spotted and that it had died of natural causes.

“It is not the first dead sea creature to have washed ashore and leave spectators flummoxed. In 2015, two short-finned pilot whales (Globicephala macrorhynchus - dolphin family) washed up on a nearby beach,” Faizal said.

As for the recently found dead dolphin, prior to a lab test, the cause of death of the animal remained a mystery and it was thought to have died at least three days before being washed up on shore.

Initially, locals believed it may have been a giant dugong, while others online suspected it might be another creature.

The discovery was said to have baffled marine experts across Labuan initially, but Labuan Veterinary Department director Dr Marysia James Abie said that judging by the appearance of the head, it was clearly a dolphin.

“I doubt that it lived in our waters. Most likely, the animal was brought by the warm current,” she said.

A jogger stumbled upon the carcass on the popular picnic coastline on Wednesday morning and alerted the Fisheries Department.

The status of Irrawaddy dolphins has been raised from vulnerable to endangered as its numbers have fallen by half over the past 60 years due to human activity, according to the latest Red List of Threatened Species of the International Union for Conservation of Nature. – Bernama, April 19, 2019.