Critter of the Week Spade-toothed whal

This week's critter might be the most mysterious mammal on Earth. There are only seven records of the spade-toothed whale, Mesoplodon traversii - despite it being the size of a car. The first record of this species is from a jawbone found on the Chatham Islands in 1872, but it took another 130 years for scientists to decide the strange-looking jaw with its spade-shaped teeth belonged to a new species. And it wasn't until 2010, when two spade-toothed whales stranded in the Bay of Plenty, that we saw a whole whale. Last year, a spade-toothed whale stranded on a beach in Dunedin and, thanks to quick work by the Department of Conservation and the local Runaka, scientists were able to properly examine the species for the first time.