(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-03-03 08:46

MIAMI - Preliminary results of a necropsy show that a pygmy sperm whale found stranded off the Florida Keys died of heart failure, marine mammal experts said.

The 10 1/2-foot, 985-pound male was discovered by a fisherman Feb. 23, stranded in shallow water off the upper Keys. It was taken hours later to the Marine Mammal Conservancy in Key Largo for treatment, but died unexpectedly on Wednesday.

"When you look at fluid backed up in the lung and into the liver, it tells you it's congestive heart failure," Robert Lingenfelser, the center's president, said Friday.

A final report is to be issued within three months.

Elsewhere, officials at the Georgia Aquarium in Atlanta say they have not been able to explain the death of a female beluga whale named Marina. The whale died Dec. 1 after she stopped eating and appeared disoriented while swimming.

Results of some tests on tissue from Marina are still pending but so far there is "no conclusive cause" of death, Georgia Aquarium spokeswoman Meghann Gibbons said Saturday.

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