Plastic oceans

Originally believed to be a minke whale, a postmortem revealed it to be a fin whale. It was the fifth fin whale to be stranded in the county for the last 25 years.

Scars on its 10.7m (36ft) body brought forward the possibility that the whale might have been struck by a ship's propeller, but this has not yet been confirmed. A spokesman from the Coastguard said that the propeller wounds were probably caused by a collision with a ship after it died.

Instead, he offered another possibility: "It probably died of contamination after eating a plastic bag or something similar."