People seeking a jawbone souvenir badly mutilated one of two dead whales that have been found on Kaipara's west coast beaches. Department of Conservation officers inspected the first find - a decomposing three-metre carcass 10km south of Glinks Gully - on Sunday. The whale's head had been cut off and sliced intwo, with the lower half missing. DOC biodiversity programme manager Leigh Honnor said it was hard to know whether the whale had died on the beach or been washed ashore - but it had almost certainly been cut up on the beach for its jawbone. A second whale, a 2.2m pygmy right whale, was discovered at Omamari Beach on Tuesday. Ms Honnor said although the baby whale had a piece of baleen plate missing from its mouth, the cause of death was not obvious. DOC staff photographed the whales and sent tissue samples to Massey University for DNA testing to confirm the species. The Omamari whale was taken back to the Department of Conservation offices at Waipoua where local iwi would be contacted to decide what to do with the remains.
