Rescuers free whale trapped by ropes off Skye

Volunteer rescuers have freed a humpback whale entangled in ropes at a Skye salmon farm.

The animal was spotted in difficulty at Organic Sea Harvest's Invertote site near Staffin in the north of the island on Thursday morning.

British Divers Marine Life Rescue (BDMLR) said the rope was wrapped around the whale's head and left fin. The rope is believed to have snagged on a heavy duty chain anchoring a mooring buoy to the seabed.

The charity said the whale, which is about 8-9m (26-29ft) long, was exhausted but had since swum off and was last seen near Gairloch east of Skye on the Highland mainland.

Organic Sea Harvest said during the rescue it was noted the whale had previously been entangled and was carrying old rope of a type not used on the fish farm.

A spokesperson said: "It was this existing entangled rope which caught onto the farm moorings as it swam by.

"Thankfully the BDMLR team were not only able to free the whale from the salmon farm, but they were also able to free it of the other ropes it had been carrying."

The Scottish Entanglement Alliance (SEA) said it was believed it was a young whale.

How do you rescue a whale?

BDMLR volunteers working to free the whale

Martin Boon, of BDMLR, told BBC Radio's Good Morning Scotland programme the rope was wrapped multiple times around the humpback's head and left fin.

He said the charity followed a technique that was developed in the US, and used for the first time in Europe in 2011, to free entangled whales.

Special knives attached to poles are used to cut the rope in a set sequence.

The last cut finally frees the animal and avoids the risk of it still having some of the rope attached to it.

Mr Boon said Organic Sea Harvest provided small inflatable boats to allow a BDMLR team to get close to the humpback.

He said the rescue was "potentially risky".

"Obviously it is humpback - they are big and powerful," he said.

"If it thrashes about and it catches anybody in the team, that's not going to end well."

Mr Boon said most people working in the fishing industry were keen to help out when whales were in difficulty.

SEA co-ordinator Ellie MacLennan said it was rare in Scotland for whales to become entangled at fish farms.

She said the size of the humpback suggested it had recently weaned from its mother.

Ms MacLennan told BBC Scotland News: "There have been sightings reported in recent weeks of a mother and calf pair and of adult and juvenile animals.

"There was no mother hanging around yesterday, so it's likely to be independent of its mother."

What is ghost gear and the risks it poses?

A 100kg "litter ball" was found in the stomach of whale that washed up in Harris in 2019

BDMLR, which was set up 40 years ago, successfully rescued a humpback caught in creel ropes in Loch Fyne in Argyll on 4 November.

But other whales have not been so lucky.

In May 2023, a humpback whale that washed up in a Highland loch possibly died after becoming caught up in creel fishing lines, say experts.

The animal's carcass was found on sand banks in Loch Fleet National Nature Reserve, near Golspie.

Scottish Marine Animal Stranding Scheme (Smass) identified it as a juvenile female humpback whale.

Other humpbacks have been found dead in East Lothian and Caithness following entanglements.

These entanglements can involve creel fishing gear or ghost gear - rope and nets that have been lost or abandoned by fishing boats.

A sperm whale that died after stranding on the Isle of Harris in November 2019 had a 100kg "litter ball" in its stomach.

Fishing nets, rope, packing straps, bags and plastic cups were among the items discovered in a compacted mass during an investigation by Smass.