Previously Unseen Whale Species Washes up on New Zealand Beach

So rare scientists weren't really sure it actually existed

Not one but two specimens of the world's rarest known species of whale have been discovered on a New Zealand beach, according to a report published Monday in the journal Current Biology. The species, called the spade-toothed beaked whale, is so rare that before the find researchers weren't even sure if it still existed.

The two whales washed up on Opape Beach in New Zealand's Bay of Plenty. At first scientists thought they were examples of a much more pedestrian species, the Gray's beaked whales, which are the most commonly beached whales in the region. But after undertaking a DNA analysis — standard procedure for beached whales that die on shore — the researchers were shocked to find that the whales were spade-toothed beaked whales, a species with no known sightings that was previously known only from three partial skulls.