Japanese fishermen reported occasionally seeing a smaller, black beaked whale that they called "karasu," the Japanese word for raven, or "kuru tsuchi," black Baird's beaked whale. The testing shows the black whales, with bulbous heads and beaks like porpoises, are not dwarf varieties of more common Baird's beaked whales, a slate-gray animal. Genetic tests confirm that a mysterious, unnamed species of beaked whale only rarely seen alive by Japanese fishermen roams the northern Pacific Ocean, according to research published this week. The oldest was a skull in the Smithsonian Institution recovered from the Aleutians in 1948 and formerly thought to be a Baird's beaked whale. The largest beaked whale varieties can reach 40 feet and spend up to 90 minutes underwater hunting for squid in deep water.

Source: ABC News July 28, 2016 21:30 UTC