Emaciated orca calf spotted off Vancouver Island, researchers say [Video]

Just a couple of weeks after a new southern resident killer whale calf was first seen, its health appears to have taken a bad turn.

The U.S.-based Center for Whale Research announced the new L-Pod calf, named L128, on Sept. 16, and said researchers “did not note anything obviously wrong” with it at the time.

The story was different when field biologist Mark Malleson spotted the calf off Vancouver Island on Oct. 6.

L128 was emaciated and “looked far from healthy,” the centre said in a statement Friday. “The calf appeared lumpy and skinny.”

Researchers said the photos Malleson took of the calf show an “obvious decline” and the shape of its skull is visible. The small calf’s mother, L90, was foraging for food nearby, and the baby was with another orca from the pod, L83, which swam toward the boat with the calf draped across her nose.

“As she …