Sirius

Beluga

ligne décoration

Adopted by the employees of the Ministère du loisir, de la chasse et de la pêche

  • ID number

    DL0090

  • Sex

    Female

  • Year of birth

    Before 1973

  • Known Since

    1989

Distinctive traits

Sirius is difficult to recognize from the left flank, as her dorsal crest is very faint. On the right, however, her deep, irregular peduncle scar makes her easy to identify.

Life history

The first time Sirius was photographed, in 1989, she was already white. She was then at least 12 to 16 years old.

According to her habits and associations, Sirius is a female. She would be part of the female community on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River.

The research team determined that Sirius is a female, as she has been spotted several times with a calf. One of the clues to determining the sex of a beluga is its association with a newborn calf. However, researchers must repeatedly observe the same adult swimming with the calf, as the young are often accompanied by different adults on the same day.

Regularly seen with...

Observations history in the Estuary

1989
1990
1991
1992
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017

Years in which the animal was not observed Years in which the animal was observed

Latest news

We’re off the coast of Rivière-du-Loup. We come across a group of around twenty belugas, made up of adults and juveniles. We observe Sirius swimming with another female, Conferon Connie, and a young gray. The herd is separated into several groups of two individuals, moving in line downstream. We successfully biopsy one of the individuals, which has three small notches in the dorsal crest and a small gray line on the left flank.

Sirius was last seen over a decade ago. Is she dead? Has she remained invisible to the eye of the researcher all this time? One thing’s for sure, her history remains a valuable source of information that helps us to better understand this fragile population.

Sponsor

The employees of the Ministère du loisir, de la chasse et de la pêche adopted Bach and Sirius (1990).