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Another whale shipped out of Marineland has died at the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago.
The aquarium says Caspian, a 27-year-old female beluga, died on Wednesday despite efforts to save her.
It’s the sixth animal from the closed Niagara Falls, Ont., theme park to die after a massive relocation of whales and dolphins over the summer.
Four other belugas and one dolphin from Marineland have died since they were moved out of the former tourist attraction.
Shedd says Caspian had not been eating properly and blood samples showed abnormalities in her electrolyte levels. The park added that her blood had become “dangerously acidic.”
The aquarium says those findings helped the veterinary care team understand how sick the beluga was, but they did not establish a cause of death.
Shedd says Caspian was on life support for nearly four hours before she died.
Marineland transported 34 of its remaining belugas and dolphins to aquariums in the U.S. and Spain over the summer to spare them from euthanasia. But four belugas and one dolphin have since died in their new homes. On Friday, Chicago’s Shedd Aquarium released post-mortem details around the deaths of two belugas, indicating the whales were already sick with ‘significant gastrointestinal disease.’ Necropsy results are still being processed for the other dead animals. CBC News reached out to Marineland for comment but didn’t hear back at the time of publication.
CBC’s Puneet Nijjar explains how the animals got to this point and what scientists suggest could have led to their early deaths.
Shedd recently performed necropsies on Peekachu and Rain, two other Marineland whales that died there, and concluded that they had chronic, pre-existing diseases.
Shedd and four other aquariums in the United States and Spain helped Marineland relocate all 30 of its belugas and four dolphins over the course of six weeks this summer.
Marineland had said it was running out of money and could no longer care for the last captive whales and dolphins in Canada.
A beluga named Jelly Bean and a dolphin named Echo died at Oceanografic Valencia in Spain after the move.
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