Souvenir hunters and tourists who were taking parts off a dead grey whale beached in a park near Sooke, B.C., have forced the removal of the mammal.
The Beecher Bay First Nation brought their concerns to the Department of Fisheries after members noticed that hunks of the whale's hide and most of the baleen from its mouth had been removed.
The whale washed up on the shores of a regional park and has become a tourist attraction with many hundreds of people going to see the dead animal.
Paul Cottrell with the Fisheries Department says the First Nation and department quickly found a burial site and a tug boat and today's removal and burial of the carcass went well.
In about two years time, Vancouver Island University will dig up the carcass and will be using its skeleton for research and display.
It's believed the young grey whale died of starvation while travelling between the Mexican Baja and its feeding grounds in the Bering Sea.
