During the 1967 construction works along the railway Arkhangelsk-Karpogory almost a full skeleton of a whale more than 15 m long was found in the opencast on the left bank of the Pinega River (E 44° and N 64°) close to Shilega station, 60 m asl. According to the report by the employee of the Arkhangelsk museum of local history A.A. Gaskonsky (Rozanov et al., pp. 63-66), the cephalic part of the skeleton was located at the depth of 2.75 m below the surface, and the tail part - at the depth of 2.2 m. The lack of rostrum camber make us think that it was a finwhale or a young blue whale, one of true (whalebone) whale species. Such whale species do not inhabit northern seas presently. The stratigraphic position of the marine sand formation with the whale skeleton, by Rozanov et al. (1976), is quite definite. It is sandwiched here between the Moscow and Valdai tills.

In 1972 the Shilega section was studied by E.I. Devyatova (1982, pp. 79-80). In the enclosing sand she collected shells of mollusks Tellina (Macoma) baltica, T. calcarea, Mytilus edulis, Cyprina (Arctica) islandica, Joldia arctica, etc. and the palynocomplex (palynozone KAll-a) similar to palynocomplex from the Siya strata (upper sea bench) on the right bank of the Northern Dvina River was identified. The Siya strata, according to Devyatova (1982, p. 70) are identical to the Strelna strata on the Tersky Coast of the Kola Peninsula.

Presently the datings from the Strelna and underlying Ponoi strata from between the Moscovian and Valdai tills suggest that these strata, associated with two marine transgressions, were deposited in a sea continuously persisting in the interval no less than 130 to 80-70 kyr. This sea is correlative to the entire MIS 5 (Korsakova et al, 2004).

Therefore, it is likely that the Shilega whale swam up to a shallow mussel bank of the Pinega Gulf at the high tide and firmly embedded himself onto the bottom during the second half of the Mikulino interglacial (s.l).

Reference:

Borisov B.A. On the age of a fossil whale from the Quaternary sediments in the river Pinega valley, the Archangelsk region. Correlation of Pleistocene Events in the Russian North. International Workshop Abstracts. 4-6 December 2006. Saint-Petersburg, 2006, p. 18.