Marine Mammals of Europe: Seals, Dolphins, Whales, and Porpoises

Europe’s regional seas support seals and other pinnipeds, dolphins, porpoises, baleen whales and toothed whales across a range extending from Svalbard sea ice to the Mediterranean and Black Sea. The European Environment Agency’s broad regional-sea account uses a total of 44 marine mammal species, but that figure combines established populations, seasonal visitors and species known mainly from uncommon records. The fauna is therefore best understood by separating taxonomy, regional occurrence and population status rather than treating every listed animal as equally widespread. [a]

Broad European scope

44 species

EEA regional-sea inventory, including regular and occasional occurrence.

Pinnipeds in that scope

8 species

Seven true seals plus the Atlantic walrus.

Black Sea cetaceans

3 endemic subspecies

Common dolphin, bottlenose dolphin and harbour porpoise forms.

Baltic year-round cetacean

Harbour porpoise

Several management populations occur around the Baltic region.

Four Familiar Labels, Two Main Evolutionary Lineages

“Seal,” “dolphin,” “whale” and “porpoise” are not four equivalent taxonomic ranks. Europe’s seals and walrus are pinnipeds within Carnivora. Whales, dolphins and porpoises are cetaceans within Artiodactyla in the current Society for Marine Mammalogy list. The same list places the walrus in Odobenidae, the true seals in Phocidae, dolphins in Delphinidae and the harbour porpoise in Phocoenidae. Its April 2026 edition is also the taxonomic basis for the accepted scientific names used below. [b]

Cetaceans divide into Mysticeti, the baleen whales, and Odontoceti, the toothed whales, dolphins and porpoises. Baleen whales filter prey through keratin plates. Odontocetes have teeth and include echolocating species such as sperm whales, beaked whales, dolphins and porpoises. Common names can obscure those relationships: the killer whale, false killer whale, pygmy killer whale, melon-headed whale and both pilot whales are members of the dolphin family. [c]

Common label	Taxonomic placement	European examples	Biological distinction
True seals	Carnivora; Pinnipedia; Phocidae	Harbour, gray, monk, ringed, harp, hooded and bearded seals	Return to land or ice for resting, moulting, birth and nursing; no external ear pinnae.
Walrus	Carnivora; Pinnipedia; Odobenidae	Atlantic walrus	A pinniped, but not a true seal; adults have tusks and feed largely on benthic prey.
Baleen whales	Artiodactyla; Cetacea; Mysticeti	Minke, fin, blue, sei, humpback, bowhead, right and gray whales	Use baleen rather than teeth to capture krill or schooling prey.
Oceanic dolphins	Artiodactyla; Cetacea; Odontoceti; Delphinidae	Bottlenose, common, striped and Risso’s dolphins, orca and pilot whales	Toothed, echolocating cetaceans with varied social and feeding systems.
Porpoises	Artiodactyla; Cetacea; Odontoceti; Phocoenidae	Harbour porpoise	Separate family from dolphins; small body, blunt head and spade-shaped teeth.
Other toothed whales	Artiodactyla; Cetacea; Odontoceti	Sperm, beaked, beluga and narwhal	Includes deep-diving squid hunters and Arctic monodontids.

The 44-Species European Regional-Sea Checklist

The checklist below reconciles the EEA’s broad 44-species scope with the European Commission Joint Research Centre’s marine-mammal reference work and current accepted names. The JRC list was built for EU Marine Strategy Directive reporting from Member State reports, EU nature law, regional-sea conventions and international taxonomic or conservation sources. The JRC report explicitly states that its reporting lists were not designed as all-time inventories of every stray record. [d]

Why a record does not always mean a resident population

The operational list includes species associated with the European Arctic, Macaronesia and contiguous Atlantic waters as well as the Baltic, North Sea, Mediterranean and Black Sea. “Exceptional” means that documented evidence exists within this broad scope, not that a breeding population is established. An all-time ledger of single vagrants would be longer and would change whenever a new record is verified.

Pinnipeds: Eight Species from Sea Caves to Arctic Ice

Common name	Accepted scientific name	Strongest European association	Occurrence pattern
Atlantic walrus	Odobenus rosmarus	European Arctic: Svalbard and the Barents Sea	Regional Arctic resident
Hooded seal	Cystophora cristata	Greenland and Norwegian seas; occasional farther south	Arctic and North Atlantic migrant
Bearded seal	Erignathus barbatus	Svalbard and other ice-influenced Arctic waters	Regional Arctic resident
Gray seal	Halichoerus grypus	Northeast Atlantic, North Sea and Baltic Sea	Resident breeding populations
Mediterranean monk seal	Monachus monachus	Eastern Mediterranean and eastern Atlantic colonies	Resident, highly localized
Harp seal	Pagophilus groenlandicus	Greenland, Norwegian and Barents seas	Migratory ice-associated species
Harbour seal	Phoca vitulina	Northeast Atlantic coasts, North Sea and Baltic margins	Resident breeding populations
Ringed seal	Pusa hispida	European Arctic and northern Baltic Sea	Resident, ice-associated populations

Baleen Whales: Nine Species in the Regional-Sea Scope

Common name	Accepted scientific name	Strongest European association	Occurrence pattern
Bowhead whale	Balaena mysticetus	Svalbard–Barents Sea sector of the European Arctic	Regional Arctic occurrence
North Atlantic right whale	Eubalaena glacialis	Eastern North Atlantic and European coasts	Exceptional modern record; historical range
Gray whale	Eschrichtius robustus	Atlantic-facing European and Mediterranean records	Exceptional vagrant
Common minke whale	Balaenoptera acutorostrata	North Atlantic, North Sea, Norwegian and Arctic waters	Regular and seasonal
Sei whale	Balaenoptera borealis	Deep Northeast Atlantic waters	Seasonal or occasional
Bryde’s whale	Balaenoptera edeni	Macaronesian and warm eastern Atlantic waters	Regional and uncommon
Blue whale	Balaenoptera musculus	North Atlantic and European Arctic	Seasonal and scarce
Fin whale	Balaenoptera physalus	Northeast Atlantic and Mediterranean Sea	Regular in more than one region
Humpback whale	Megaptera novaeangliae	North Atlantic, Norwegian and Arctic waters	Seasonal and migratory

Deep-Diving and Arctic Toothed Whales

Common name	Accepted scientific name	Strongest European association	Occurrence pattern
Sperm whale	Physeter macrocephalus	Deep Northeast Atlantic and Mediterranean waters	Regular in suitable deep habitat
Pygmy sperm whale	Kogia breviceps	Macaronesia and scattered offshore or stranding records	Occasional
Dwarf sperm whale	Kogia sima	Warm eastern Atlantic and rare European records	Exceptional or occasional
Northern bottlenose whale	Hyperoodon ampullatus	Deep North Atlantic and Norwegian Sea	Regular offshore, rarely observed
Sowerby’s beaked whale	Mesoplodon bidens	Temperate and cold Northeast Atlantic	Regular offshore, rarely observed
Blainville’s beaked whale	Mesoplodon densirostris	Macaronesia; isolated records elsewhere	Regional and occasional
Gervais’ beaked whale	Mesoplodon europaeus	Warm eastern Atlantic and Macaronesia	Regional and rare
True’s beaked whale	Mesoplodon mirus	Deep North Atlantic, including Macaronesia	Rarely recorded
Cuvier’s beaked whale	Ziphius cavirostris	Mediterranean slopes, Atlantic islands and deep oceanic waters	Regular in deep-water regions
Beluga	Delphinapterus leucas	Svalbard and European Arctic waters	Regional Arctic resident; rare vagrant south
Narwhal	Monodon monoceros	High Arctic waters near Greenland and Svalbard	Regional Arctic occurrence

Dolphins and the Harbour Porpoise

Common name	Accepted scientific name	Strongest European association	Occurrence pattern
Short-beaked common dolphin	Delphinus delphis	Northeast Atlantic, Mediterranean and Black Sea	Regular, with regional populations
Pygmy killer whale	Feresa attenuata	Warm eastern Atlantic and Macaronesia	Exceptional or regional rare
Short-finned pilot whale	Globicephala macrorhynchus	Macaronesia and warm contiguous Atlantic waters	Regional
Long-finned pilot whale	Globicephala melas	Northeast Atlantic and parts of the western Mediterranean	Regular offshore
Risso’s dolphin	Grampus griseus	Northeast Atlantic and Mediterranean slopes	Regular in deep and slope waters
Fraser’s dolphin	Lagenodelphis hosei	Warm Atlantic and Macaronesian records	Exceptional or regional rare
White-beaked dolphin	Lagenorhynchus albirostris	North Sea and cold Northeast Atlantic shelf waters	Regular
Atlantic white-sided dolphin	Leucopleurus acutus	Temperate and cold Northeast Atlantic	Regular offshore
Killer whale	Orcinus orca	European Arctic and Northeast Atlantic; scarce in the Mediterranean	Regional and wide-ranging
Melon-headed whale	Peponocephala electra	Warm eastern Atlantic and Macaronesian records	Exceptional or regional rare
False killer whale	Pseudorca crassidens	Macaronesia and occasional Mediterranean or Atlantic records	Regional rare or occasional
Striped dolphin	Stenella coeruleoalba	Mediterranean and warm offshore Atlantic waters	Regular
Atlantic spotted dolphin	Stenella frontalis	Macaronesia and warm eastern Atlantic	Regional
Rough-toothed dolphin	Steno bredanensis	Warm Atlantic and parts of the Mediterranean	Regional and uncommon
Common bottlenose dolphin	Tursiops truncatus	Atlantic coasts, North Sea, Mediterranean and Black Sea	Regular, coastal and offshore forms
Harbour porpoise	Phocoena phocoena	Northeast Atlantic, Baltic, Black Sea and northern Aegean	Regular; regional populations differ

Atlantic white-sided dolphin taxonomy changed in the 2026 list

The accepted name used here is Leucopleurus acutus. Older European reports frequently place the species in Lagenorhynchus as Lagenorhynchus acutus. Searches of older datasets should account for both genus combinations, while the white-beaked dolphin remains Lagenorhynchus albirostris.

European Seas Produce Different Mammal Communities

Latitude alone does not explain the pattern. Sea ice, salinity, shelf width, submarine canyons, seasonal productivity, prey movement and access to undisturbed resting or breeding sites all shape which mammals occur in each region. A species may also occupy several habitat types: bottlenose dolphins include coastal communities and offshore forms, while fin whales use both Northeast Atlantic and Mediterranean waters.

European marine region	Characteristic marine mammals	Habitat pattern that shapes occurrence
European Arctic and Barents Sea	Atlantic walrus, bearded, harp, hooded and ringed seals; bowhead, minke, humpback and blue whales; beluga, narwhal and orca	Seasonal sea ice, shelf-edge production and dense fish or zooplankton patches.
Norwegian Sea and Northeast Atlantic	Minke, fin, humpback, sei and sperm whales; long-finned pilot whale; Atlantic white-sided and white-beaked dolphins	Ocean fronts, migration routes, deep basins and productive shelf breaks.
North Sea and English Channel	Harbour and gray seals, harbour porpoise, white-beaked dolphin and localized bottlenose dolphin communities	Shallow shelf waters, tidal banks, estuaries and heavily used coastal corridors.
Baltic Sea	Gray, harbour and ringed seals; harbour porpoise	Low salinity, restricted exchange with the North Sea, northern winter ice and isolated population structure.
Bay of Biscay and Iberian Atlantic	Common, bottlenose and Risso’s dolphins; pilot, sperm and beaked whales; several baleen whales	A narrow shelf, steep slopes, submarine canyons and nearby deep water.
Macaronesia and contiguous Atlantic	Short-finned pilot whale, Atlantic spotted dolphin, bottlenose dolphin, Bryde’s whale and several rarely recorded warm-water odontocetes	Oceanic islands, steep volcanic slopes and warm deep waters close to shore.
Mediterranean Sea	Fin and sperm whales; Cuvier’s beaked, long-finned pilot, Risso’s, striped, common and bottlenose dolphins; Mediterranean monk seal	Semi-enclosed basin with deep trenches, slope habitat, productive fronts and fragmented seal breeding sites.
Black Sea	Black Sea common dolphin, Black Sea bottlenose dolphin and Black Sea harbour porpoise	Semi-enclosed low-salinity basin with endemic subspecies and limited exchange through the Turkish Straits.

Pinnipeds of Europe: Coastal Haul-Outs, Sea Caves and Breeding Ice

Harbour and Gray Seals Share Coasts but Not the Same Profile

Harbour seals and gray seals overlap around the North Sea, British and Irish coasts, and parts of the Baltic region. Harbour seals usually show a shorter, rounded head, a marked forehead and nostrils that form a V-like pattern when closed. Gray seals have a longer head with a straighter or outward-curving muzzle. Adult male gray seals can be much more heavily built than harbour seals. Colour alone is unreliable because age, moult, wet fur and light alter the apparent pattern.

Both species need haul-out sites, yet they use them differently across regions. Sandbanks, tidal flats, rocky islands and sheltered beaches may serve as resting, moulting or breeding sites. A change in the number of seals visible ashore can reflect tide, weather, season or disturbance rather than an immediate change in population size.

Ice-Associated Pinnipeds Separate the Arctic from the Baltic

Bearded, harp and hooded seals are centred on Arctic or sub-Arctic waters. Atlantic walruses also belong to the European Arctic fauna, where shallow feeding grounds and accessible resting surfaces matter. Ringed seals occur in the high Arctic and as the Baltic subspecies Pusa hispida botnica. Ringed seals create or use snow-covered structures on sea ice for birth and early pup protection, linking their reproductive success directly to winter ice and snow conditions.

The northern Baltic is not a small copy of the Arctic Ocean. Its low salinity, enclosed geography and isolated seal populations create a different management setting. Gray seals are widely distributed around the basin, while ringed seals are concentrated in northern and eastern ice-forming areas. Harbour seals have a much narrower Baltic distribution than in the Northeast Atlantic.

Mediterranean Monk Seals Depend on a Small Set of Secure Breeding Sites

The Mediterranean monk seal is the only resident seal species in the Mediterranean. Many breeding groups use coastal caves with protected interior beaches, although open beaches remain part of the species’ natural habitat where disturbance is low. Loss or disturbance of pupping sites, deliberate killing, prey and fishery interactions, and entanglement have all contributed to its restricted distribution. In June 2023, IUCN moved the species from Endangered to Vulnerable after evidence of recovery and reoccupation in parts of its range. [i]

An IUCN account published in 2026 placed the global population at roughly 800–1,000 individuals, with the main surviving groups in Greece, Türkiye and Cyprus, as well as Madeira and Cabo Blanco in the eastern Atlantic. The lower threat category records measurable improvement; it does not remove the risks created by a small number of breeding areas and human activity near caves. [j]

Dolphins and Porpoises: Coast, Shelf and Open-Water Specialists

Bottlenose Dolphins Cannot Be Reduced to One Coastal Pattern

Common bottlenose dolphins occur in coastal embayments, estuaries, shelf waters and oceanic habitat. Some communities have limited home ranges and can be followed through photographs of dorsal-fin notches and scars. Others travel over much larger areas. This difference matters when interpreting sightings: repeated observations near one estuary may represent a local community, while offshore records can belong to a separate ecological grouping.

Short-beaked common dolphins often form fast-moving groups over productive shelf or oceanic waters. Striped dolphins are especially characteristic of warm open waters in the Mediterranean. Risso’s dolphins are associated with slope habitat and squid prey; adults often become pale from accumulated skin scarring. White-beaked dolphins are tied more strongly to cool Northeast Atlantic shelf waters, while Atlantic white-sided dolphins are more oceanic.

Porpoises Are Not Small Dolphins

The harbour porpoise belongs to Phocoenidae rather than Delphinidae. It has a blunt head without the long beak seen in many dolphins, a small triangular dorsal fin and a compact body. Its surfacing is often brief and low. Those traits make visual surveys harder than for species that leap or approach vessels, and they help explain the wide use of passive acoustic detectors in Baltic and North Sea research.

The same species name does not imply one uniform European population. Harbour porpoises in the North Sea, Belt Sea, Baltic Proper and Black Sea differ in population structure and conservation setting. Regional or subpopulation assessments can therefore be far more severe than the global species assessment.

Orcas and Pilot Whales Are Dolphins with Whale Names

Orcas are the largest delphinids. European groups do not all use the same prey: some North Atlantic communities specialize heavily on fish, while others take marine mammals or mixed prey. Long-finned pilot whales occupy deep Atlantic and some western Mediterranean waters and feed largely on cephalopods. Short-finned pilot whales are more closely associated with warmer waters around Macaronesia. Their common names describe body form and tradition, not membership in a separate whale family.

Whales of Europe: Filter Feeders and Deep-Diving Hunters

Minke, Fin and Humpback Whales Account for Many Regular Baleen-Whale Records

Common minke whales are the smallest baleen whales regularly seen across northern European waters. Their narrow, pointed head and the white band on the flipper of North Atlantic animals can aid identification. Fin whales are much larger and occur in both the Northeast Atlantic and the Mediterranean. The lower jaw is asymmetrically coloured, with a pale right side, but that feature is rarely visible at distance.

Humpback whales use North Atlantic migration routes and northern feeding grounds. Their long flippers, knobbled head and individually marked tail flukes make them suitable for photo-identification. Blue and sei whales also occur in the North Atlantic, although encounters in many European sectors are sparse. The North Atlantic right whale is now an exceptional modern record in eastern Atlantic waters, while gray-whale records are treated as vagrancy rather than evidence of a restored European population.

The Mediterranean Fin Whale Is a Regional Population, Not a Generic Atlantic Record

The Mediterranean’s regularly occurring baleen whale is the fin whale. ACCOBAMS survey reporting has placed the basin-wide estimate slightly above 2,000 animals, while also stressing uneven seasonal distribution and the need to separate Mediterranean patterns from adjacent Atlantic occurrence. [k] The species overlaps with busy shipping areas, so population work combines line-transect surveys, photo-identification, acoustic data and evidence from collisions.

Mediterranean cetacean assessments also treat sperm whales, Cuvier’s beaked whales, long-finned pilot whales, Risso’s dolphins and several smaller dolphins as regional populations rather than extensions of a single undivided Atlantic stock. The IUCN Mediterranean reassessment published in 2023 brought together assessments completed from 2018 to 2022 and showed why basin-level status can differ from a species’ global category. [h]

Sperm and Beaked Whales Reveal the Importance of Deep Water

Sperm whales hunt squid at depth and are recognized at the surface by a low blow angled forward and to the left. Cuvier’s beaked whales, northern bottlenose whales and Mesoplodon species spend little time at the surface and may be difficult to identify even under good conditions. Deep canyons, continental slopes and oceanic island margins are therefore central parts of Europe’s marine-mammal habitat, not empty water between coastal populations.

Beaked-whale evidence often comes from acoustic detections, strandings, genetic samples and a limited number of confirmed photographs. A species recorded from one carcass or one verified encounter should not be mapped as continuously present across the surrounding sea.

Population Scale Changes the Conservation Answer

A species can be widespread at ocean scale while one European population is isolated, small or exposed to a particular pressure. Conservation categories must be attached to the assessed unit and assessment year. Applying a global category to the Baltic Proper, Mediterranean or Black Sea without checking the regional assessment can hide the condition that matters locally.

Baltic Proper Harbour Porpoise

The Baltic Proper harbour porpoise is treated as a separate management population and remains Critically Endangered in the 2023 IUCN assessment and the 2025 HELCOM red-list work cited by ASCOBANS. The 2026 Jastarnia Plan progress report identifies bycatch, underwater noise, habitat use and coordinated monitoring as continuing work areas. Its second basin-scale passive-acoustic survey, SAMBAH II, ended in August 2025; abundance and distribution analysis is being carried out through the CUMBIAH project, which began in 2026. A new abundance figure should not be inferred before that analysis is released. [f]

A Baltic detection may belong to another population

Harbour porpoises from the Belt Sea and adjacent waters can enter parts of the Baltic. An acoustic detection or stranded animal within the basin does not automatically prove that the individual belongs to the Baltic Proper population. Distribution season, genetics and location are needed when population identity matters.

Three Endemic Cetacean Subspecies in the Black Sea

The Black Sea supports three resident cetacean forms: Delphinus delphis ponticus, Tursiops truncatus ponticus and Phocoena phocoena relicta. A coordinated aerial survey in summer 2019 recorded 1,744 cetacean sightings along 7,344 kilometres of transects and produced the first basin-scale summer abundance and density estimates for all three. The authors cautioned that the values are survey-period estimates and that prey depletion, bycatch, pollution and disease remain active pressures. [g]

The Black Sea is connected to the Mediterranean through a narrow strait system, yet its cetaceans should not be merged into a general Mediterranean account. Endemic subspecies, low salinity, regional prey dynamics and a history of direct exploitation create a separate biological and assessment unit.

North-East Atlantic Assessments Leave Many Unknowns

OSPAR’s 2023 regional assessment found that the condition of seals and small toothed cetaceans was not good in the assessed North-East Atlantic context, while the state of many other marine mammals remained unknown because available indicators did not cover every species or region. [e] “Unknown” is not evidence of safety; it means the checked monitoring and assessment system did not support a firm status result.

Pressures Follow Habitat, Fishing Method and Behaviour

Pressure	Groups often exposed	How the pressure operates in European waters
Incidental capture in fishing gear	Harbour porpoises, dolphins and seals	Animals caught in gillnets, trawls or other gear may drown, suffer injury or be lost before reaching shore.
Entanglement	Large whales, seals and smaller cetaceans	Ropes, nets and discarded gear can restrict movement, feeding or breathing and may cause long-term wounds.
Vessel collision	Fin, sperm and other large whales	Risk rises where feeding, travelling or surface-resting habitat overlaps dense and fast ship traffic.
Continuous underwater noise	Porpoises, dolphins and other toothed whales	Shipping can reduce communication space and alter habitat use over long periods.
Impulsive sound	Beaked whales, porpoises and other sound-sensitive cetaceans	Sonar, piling, explosions and seismic sources can disturb behaviour; risk varies with sound type, distance and species.
Coastal disturbance	Breeding or resting seals and coastal dolphins	Repeated approach, cave entry, dogs, watercraft and coastal construction can displace animals from needed sites.
Contaminants	Long-lived predators with high trophic positions	Persistent chemicals can accumulate in blubber and move from mothers to offspring.
Sea-ice and snow change	Ringed, harp, hooded and bearded seals; walrus	Changes in ice timing, stability and snow cover alter resting, pupping or feeding access.
Prey change	All groups, with different diets	Fishing pressure and ecosystem change can shift the amount, size and location of fish or cephalopod prey.

Bycatch is especially difficult to measure because many carcasses sink, drift away or are not recovered. OSPAR’s marine-mammal bycatch assessment therefore combines observer data, monitoring programmes, strandings and population information, while acknowledging gaps in fleet and species coverage. [l] A low number of recovered animals cannot be treated as the total number killed.

Evidence for Animals That Spend Little Time at the Surface

Aerial and Ship Surveys Estimate Density over Defined Periods

Line-transect surveys record animals along a designed route and model the number missed by observers. Their estimates refer to a stated area, season and set of sea conditions. They are not permanent counts. Weather, group size, diving behaviour and the observer’s ability to identify a species all affect detection.

Passive Acoustics Can Reveal Porpoises and Deep Divers

Fixed detectors record echolocation clicks over months or years and are especially useful for harbour porpoises. Towed or fixed hydrophones also detect sperm whales and some beaked whales. Acoustic detections can show presence and seasonal activity, but converting detections into abundance requires calibration, detection-range estimates and survey design. A raw click count is not an animal count.

Photographs, Tissue and Strandings Answer Different Questions

Dorsal fins, saddle patches and tail flukes can identify individuals when markings are stable enough. Biopsy and stranded-animal samples support genetic, contaminant, diet and health work. Strandings also document species that are rarely seen alive, yet the stranding location may not equal the animal’s normal habitat. Currents, decomposition and search effort affect what reaches shore and what is reported.

Field Characters That Separate Europe’s Commonly Confused Groups

Identification problem	Useful characters	Frequent source of error
Harbour seal or gray seal	Head profile, muzzle length, nostril shape and adult body proportions	Coat colour changes with wetness, age and moult.
Harbour porpoise or small dolphin	Blunt head, compact body, low surfacing and small triangular dorsal fin in the porpoise	Distance can hide the beak and make body size difficult to judge.
Common or striped dolphin	Hourglass-like flank pattern in the common dolphin; dark eye-to-flipper and eye-to-anus stripes in the striped dolphin	Glare and partial surfacing conceal flank markings.
White-beaked or Atlantic white-sided dolphin	White-beaked dolphin is more heavily built with a pale beak; Atlantic white-sided dolphin has a more elongated pale flank patch	Pattern varies and offshore views are brief.
Fin or sei whale	Fin whale often shows asymmetric right-side jaw colour and a long interval between blow and dorsal fin; sei whale generally shows the fin sooner	Body colour and blow height overlap under poor viewing conditions.
Sperm whale or baleen whale	Sperm whale has a block-shaped head, low left-angled blow and wrinkled body surface	Only part of the back may be visible.
Beaked whale species	Beak shape, forehead, tooth position in adult males, scars, body proportions and genetic evidence	Many females and young animals cannot be assigned safely from a distant sighting.

A seal ashore is not automatically stranded

Seals routinely leave the water to rest, moult, give birth or nurse. A lone animal on a beach should be given space, with people and dogs kept away. Visible injury, entanglement, repeated harassment or an animal far outside suitable habitat should be reported to the responsible local wildlife authority rather than handled or pushed into the sea.

Sources and Verification

[a] WISE Marine: Marine Mammals — Used for the 44-species regional-sea total, the eight-pinniped scope and the distinction between regular and occasional cetaceans.
[b] Society for Marine Mammalogy: List of Marine Mammal Species and Subspecies — Used for accepted species names, family placement and the April 2026 treatment of Leucopleurus acutus.
[c] International Whaling Commission: Classification of Cetacea — Used for the baleen-whale and toothed-whale division and the placement of dolphins and porpoises within Odontoceti.
[d] European Commission JRC: Reference Lists of MSFD Species and Habitats — Used for the EU marine-mammal reporting scope, source hierarchy and the stated non-exhaustive purpose of the MSFD reference list.
[e] OSPAR Quality Status Report 2023: Marine Mammals — State — Used for the North-East Atlantic assessment finding for seals, small toothed cetaceans and unassessed or unknown outcomes.
[f] ASCOBANS: 2026 Progress Report on the Jastarnia Plan — Used for the Baltic Proper harbour porpoise category, SAMBAH II completion, CUMBIAH analysis and current pressure priorities.
[g] Paiu et al. 2024: Black Sea Cetacean Aerial Survey — Used for the three endemic subspecies, survey distance, sighting total and basin-scale summer estimates.
[h] IUCN: Conservation Status of Cetaceans in the Mediterranean Sea — Used for the regional assessment approach and the 2018–2022 Mediterranean cetacean assessment cycle.
[i] Marine Mammal Commission: Mediterranean Monk Seal — Used for the June 2023 change from Endangered to Vulnerable and the principal documented threats.
[j] IUCN: Mediterranean Monk Seal Population Account, 2026 — Used for the reported global estimate of 800–1,000 animals and the main surviving regional groups.
[k] ACCOBAMS Survey Initiative: 2023 Results Brochure — Used for the Mediterranean fin-whale context and basin-level abundance estimate.
[l] OSPAR Quality Status Report 2023: Marine Mammal Bycatch — Used for bycatch evidence sources, fleet-coverage limits and the gap between recovered carcasses and total mortality.