. The Canadian field-naturalist. 370 The Canadian Field-Naturalist Vol. 102. Figure L A Gray Whale during the southward migration off Point Loma, San Diego, California. Photograph by R. Reeves. All subsequent work has shown that the Gray Whale has a variety of distinctive characteristics (Barnes and McLeod 1984), which support its assignment to a separate monotypic family, Eschrichtiidae Ellerman and Morrison-Scott 1951. The Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada has requested a review of the Gray Whale's conservation status. Because several geographically distinct stocks of
. The Canadian field-naturalist. 370 The Canadian Field-Naturalist Vol. 102. Figure L A Gray Whale during the southward migration off Point Loma, San Diego, California. Photograph by R. Reeves. All subsequent work has shown that the Gray Whale has a variety of distinctive characteristics (Barnes and McLeod 1984), which support its assignment to a separate monotypic family, Eschrichtiidae Ellerman and Morrison-Scott 1951. The Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada has requested a review of the Gray Whale's conservation status. Because several geographically distinct stocks of Gray Whales exist (or existed), it is necessary to consider each of these stocks separately. As the species is the sole living representative of its family, there is a particular note of urgency about its preservation. Distribution and Stock Identity North Atlantic: The sum of knowledge about Gray Whale distribution in the eastern North Atlantic consists of seven subfossil specimens {listed by Mead and Mitchell 1984: Table 1, Figure 2) and of inferences made from sixteenth- and seventeenth-century documents describing whales found around Iceland and Spitsbergen (Eraser 1970; Mead and Mitchell 1984). From this evidence it can be stated with certainty that the Gray Whale was present in the Baltic and North seas and the English Channel, and probably around Iceland, during post-glacial times. It is unlikely that these areas represent more than a small part of the species' former Northeast Atlantic range, assuming that long-distance seasonal migrations were made there as in the North Pacific at present. Pubhshed records of subfossil specimens of Gray Whales found along the east coast of North America, numbering ten at the time of this writing (1986), span a somewhat narrower range of latitudes than those from Europe and England. The northernmost is from Long Island, New York (Mead and Mitchell 1984); the southernmost, from St. Lucie Inlet on the southeast coast of Florida (Odell 198
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