Russian ‘Spy Whale’ in Norway Wasn’t Shot Dead, Likely Died of Infection

FILE - In this photo taken in April 2019 a beluga whale found in Arctic Norway is fed. (Jorgen Ree Wiig, Norwegian Directorate of Fisheries via AP)
FILE - In this photo taken in April 2019 a beluga whale found in Arctic Norway is fed. (Jorgen Ree Wiig, Norwegian Directorate of Fisheries via AP)
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Russian ‘Spy Whale’ in Norway Wasn’t Shot Dead, Likely Died of Infection

FILE - In this photo taken in April 2019 a beluga whale found in Arctic Norway is fed. (Jorgen Ree Wiig, Norwegian Directorate of Fisheries via AP)
FILE - In this photo taken in April 2019 a beluga whale found in Arctic Norway is fed. (Jorgen Ree Wiig, Norwegian Directorate of Fisheries via AP)

A beluga whale that lived off Norway’s coast and whose harness ignited speculation that it was a Russian spy, was not shot to death as claimed by animal rights groups but died of a bacterial infection, Norwegian police said Friday.
A final autopsy by Norway's Veterinary Institute “concludes that the probable cause of death was bacterial infection -- possibly as a result of a wound in the mouth from a stuck stick,” Amund Preede Revheim, head of the North Sea and Environment section of the police in south-western Norway said.
“There have been no findings from the autopsy that indicate that the whale has been shot,” he stressed, adding that the autopsy had been “made difficult by the fact that many of the whale’s organs were very rotten.” As there was no indication of foul play, there was no reason to start a criminal investigation into its death, The Associated Press quoted Preede Revheim as saying.
The tame beluga, which was first spotted in 2019 not far from Russian waters with a harness reading “Equipment St. Petersburg,” had been nicknamed "Hvaldimir,” combining the Norwegian word for whale — hval — and the first name of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
It was found floating in a southern Norway bay on Aug. 31.
In September, animal advocate groups OneWhale and NOAH filed a police report saying that the animal’s wounds suggested it was intentionally killed.
They pointed at several wounds found on the animal’s skin, including what was interpreted as a bullet hole.
“Assessments made by the Veterinary Institute and the police’s forensic technicians are that these are not gunshot wounds. X-rays of the chest and head were carried out without any projectiles or other metal fragments being detected,” police said in a statement.
Earlier, police had described a stick about 35 centimeters (14 inches) long and 3 centimeters (1 inch) wide which was found wedged in the animal’s mouth, its stomach was empty and its organs had broken down, police said. No further details were given.
The 4.2-meter (14-foot) long and 1,225-kilogram (2,700-pound) whale was first spotted by fishermen not far from the Arctic town of Hammerfest.
Its harness, along with what appeared to be a mount for a small camera, led to media speculation that it was a “spy whale.” Experts say the Russian navy is known to have trained whales for military purposes. Media reports also have speculated that the whale might have been trained as a therapy animal.
There was no immediate reaction from OneWhale or NOAH.



First National Analysis Finds America's Butterflies are Disappearing at 'Catastrophic' Rate

FILE - A painted lady butterfly feeds on Sedum flowers in Omaha, Neb., Sept. 19, 2017. (AP Photo/Nati Harnik, File)
FILE - A painted lady butterfly feeds on Sedum flowers in Omaha, Neb., Sept. 19, 2017. (AP Photo/Nati Harnik, File)
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First National Analysis Finds America's Butterflies are Disappearing at 'Catastrophic' Rate

FILE - A painted lady butterfly feeds on Sedum flowers in Omaha, Neb., Sept. 19, 2017. (AP Photo/Nati Harnik, File)
FILE - A painted lady butterfly feeds on Sedum flowers in Omaha, Neb., Sept. 19, 2017. (AP Photo/Nati Harnik, File)

America's butterflies are disappearing because of insecticides, climate change and habitat loss, with the number of the winged beauties down 22% since 2000, a new study finds.
The first countrywide systematic analysis of butterfly abundance found that the number of butterflies in the Lower 48 states has been falling on average 1.3% a year since the turn of the century, with 114 species showing significant declines and only nine increasing, according to a study in Thursday's journal Science.
“Butterflies have been declining the last 20 years,” said study co-author Nick Haddad, an entomologist at Michigan State University. “And we don't see any sign that that's going to end."
A team of scientists combined 76,957 surveys from 35 monitoring programs and blended them for an apples-to-apples comparison and ended up counting 12.6 million butterflies over the decades, The Associated Press reported. Last month an annual survey that looked just at monarch butterflies, which federal officials plan to put on the threatened species list, counted a nearly all-time low of fewer than 10,000, down from 1.2 million in 1997.
Many of the species in decline fell by 40% or more.
‘Catastrophic and saddening’ loss over time David Wagner, a University of Connecticut entomologist who wasn't part of the study, praised its scope. And he said while the annual rate of decline may not sound significant, it is “catastrophic and saddening” when compounded over time.
“In just 30 or 40 years we are talking about losing half the butterflies (and other insect life) over a continent!” Wagner said in an email. "The tree of life is being denuded at unprecedented rates.”
The United States has 650 butterfly species, but 96 species were so sparse they didn't show up in the data and another 212 species weren't found in sufficient number to calculate trends, said study lead author Collin Edwards, an ecologist and data scientist at the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.
“I'm probably most worried about the species that couldn't even be included in the analyses” because they were so rare, said University of Wisconsin-Madison entomologist Karen Oberhauser, who wasn't part of the research.
Haddad, who specializes in rare butterflies, said in recent years he has seen just two endangered St. Francis Satyr butterflies — which only live on a bomb range at Fort Bragg in North Carolina — “so it could be extinct.”
Some well-known species had large drops. The red admiral, which is so calm it lands on people, is down 44% and the American lady butterfly, with two large eyespots on its back wings, decreased by 58%, Edwards said.
Even the invasive white cabbage butterfly, “a species that is well adapted to invade the world," according to Haddad, fell by 50%.
"How can that be?” Haddad wondered.
Butterfly decline as a warning sign for humans Cornell University butterfly expert Anurag Agrawal said he worries most about the future of a different species: Humans.
“The loss of butterflies, parrots and porpoises is undoubtedly a bad sign for us, the ecosystems we need and the nature we enjoy,” Agrawal, who wasn't part of the study, said in an email. “They are telling us that our continent's health is not doing so well ... Butterflies are an ambassador for nature's beauty, fragility and the interdependence of species. They have something to teach us.”
Oberhauser said butterflies connect people with nature and that “calms us down, makes us healthier and happier and promotes learning.”
What's happening to butterflies in the United States is probably happening to other, less-studied insects across the continent and world, Wagner said. He said not only is this the most comprehensive butterfly study, but the most data-rich for any insect.
Butterflies are also pollinators, though not as prominent as bees, and are a major source of pollination of the Texas cotton crop, Haddad said.
The biggest decrease in butterflies was in the Southwest — Arizona, New Mexico, Texas and Oklahoma — where the number of butterflies dropped by more than half in the 20 years.
“It looks like the butterflies that are in dry and warm areas are doing particularly poorly,” Edwards said. “And that kind of captures a lot of the Southwest.”
Edwards said when they looked at butterfly species that lived both in the hotter South and cooler North, the ones that did better were in the cooler areas.
Climate change, habitat loss and insecticides tend to work together to weaken butterfly populations, Edwards and Haddad said. Of the three, it seems that insecticides are the biggest cause, based on previous research from the US Midwest, Haddad said.
“It makes sense because insecticide use has changed in dramatic ways in the time since our study started,” Haddad said.
Habitats can be restored and so can butterflies, so there's hope, Haddad said.
“You can make changes in your backyard and in your neighborhood and in your state,” Haddad said. “That could really improve the situation for a lot of species.”