Image from the Biodiversity Heritage Library.
Contributed by Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, University of California, Berkeley.
| www.biodiversitylibrary.org
Transcription
P.C. ZIEGLER
1957
JOURNAL
Towed in vicinity of Farallon Islands, San Francisco Cal. Reef.
Oct 31 (cont.)
Thing except sperm whales which may be taken for another month. The boss Chuck had saved the skull of a rarity, a "Goose-beak" whale, with 2 teeth in the tip of the (lower?) jaw. I did not see this however. I could not find out what was done with the teeth of sperm whales but maybe they were sold for ivory. I also saw the lower jaw of a sperm whale waiting to be boiled out to have the teeth removed. The rear-most tooth was protected only an inch above the belly line and was about little-finger-size in diameter. I was surprised to see that it was slightly movable when twisted rather than being solidly fixed.
Got a promise of a whale vertebra from a fellow at the rendering plant if he gets a chance to boil one out so let my telephone number and said we would take any whale bones that he might want to boil out. The lower jaw of the humpback whale apparently is not ossified