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Fishery Bulletin 89(3). 1991 



tion. Reports have mostly discussed questions of 

 helminth taxonomy or identified and cataloged the 

 parasites. Klumov (1963) presented a zoogeographical 

 analysis of the helminths of whales in the world oceans. 

 Research on southern whales was begun by Russian 

 helminthologists in 1963. In the course of two commer- 

 cial voyages aboard the Sovietskia Ukraina and Glory 

 during the 1963-64 and 1965-66 whaling seasons, 

 2164 marine mammals were necropsied; 2006 of these 

 were whales. Due to the circumstances of commercial 

 whaling, dissections were often incomplete with vari- 

 ous organs being examined at varying degrees of tho- 

 roughness. The data obtained from this material were 



presented in a series of 22 papers from 1966 to 1975 

 (cited in Vogelbein 1981) and Skrjabin and Murav'eva 

 (1978). Several British sources presented further data 

 on cetacean helminths from various localities in the 

 Antarctic Ocean (Prudhoe 1969, Markowski 1971, Gib- 

 son 1973, Gibson and Harris 1979). 



The purpose of this paper is to report parasites from 

 sperm, sei, and minke whales taken by two commer- 

 cial vessels of the Japanese whaling fleet (1976-77). In 

 addition, this paper will also update existing host- 

 parasite lists, identify apparent variations in the 

 zoogeographic distribution of helminths, and identify 

 those helminths which are potential stock indicators. 



Materials and methods 



The data are obtained from two sources: Original 

 materials collected by one of us (MDD) aboard the 

 Japanese factory ships Tonan Maru #2 and Nisshan 

 Maru #3 during November to March of the 1976-77 

 Japanese Antarctic whaling season, and Antarctic 

 whale host-parasite literature records from 1915-89 

 (Vogelbein 1981, present study). 



Baleen whales were captured in sectors I, IV, V, and 

 VI (Fig. la); all sperm whales were captured in sector 

 VIII (Fig. lb). The length-frequencies and ages of the 

 whales were not available to the authors. However, the 

 catcher boats tend to take the largest animals possible 

 during the harvest. Examinations of the external sur- 

 face, blubber (subsample of ventral surface anterior to 

 genital opening), organs (stomach, intestine, mesen- 

 teries, lungs, liver, kidneys, spleen, genitalia, placen- 

 ta), blood, and fecal samples were carried out on a total 

 of 176 whales, including 35 sei (Balaenoptera borealis 

 Lesson, 1828), 106 minke (Balaenoptera acutorostrata 

 Lacepede, 1804), and 35 sperm (Physeter catodon L., 

 1758). The helminths were prepared for identification 

 using standard histological procedures (Dailey 1978). 

 Voucher specimens are deposited at the Institute of 

 Parasitology, California State University, Long Beach. 



Results 



Data collected during the 1976-77 Japanese Antarc- 

 tic whaling season are presented in Tables 1 to 4 and 

 Figures 2 and 3. A complete host-parasite record from 

 all sectors for B. borealis and P. catodon is presented 

 in Tables 5 and 6. Given the paucity of material re- 

 ported from B. acutorostrata in Antarctic waters, a 

 figure on parasites by sector has been omitted and only 

 the information in Tables 1 and 3 represents this 

 species. Several helminths are not identified beyond the 

 generic level due to the condition of the specimens. 



