Marine photographers and researchers are fascinated by a humpback whale spotted on the New South Wales Far South Coast that appears to have a mighty overbite.
The whale was photographed by Wayne Reynolds, who has been documenting the annual whale migration with his camera for the past 17 years.
He saw the whale with the unusual jawline off the coast of Eden last Friday.
"In all honesty, at first I thought it was injured," he said.
"Maybe it slammed into a shipping container in the water or the rocks and pushed the whole bottom jaw back.
"But when we got closer I could see the bottom jaw in perfect form."
Shooting the breach
Mr Reynolds said the whale was splashing around in the water, which made it tricky to capture its facial features on film.
This was not the first time he had seen an animal with a misaligned jaw, but in this whale it was markedly pronounced.
Looking back on the photographs, Mr Reynolds was still unsure how to describe what he saw.
"I'm still not sure if it was an overbite — I'm still sort of convinced it was severe damage," he said.
"It looked like it was missing half its face … it also had bloody sores on its pectorals.
"But it seemed like a normal, healthy whale … it looked in reasonable condition."
'Appears to be doing well'
The photographs were sent to Macquarie University marine researcher Vanessa Pirotta, who tried to make sense of what could be a natural deformity.
"It looks like an overbite," she said.
"It is quite rare in my opinion, but there might be a few other whales around that have similar things."
Dr Pirotta said bottom jaw appeared intact and was dotted with pimple-like "tubercles", but she said interpreting the whale's full body condition from photos alone had its limits.
She took to social media to seek theories and discovered other accounts of whales sporting similar features.
She also said variations did occur in the animal world, and that the mammal appeared healthy.
"It's very active — it has maintained body condition," she said.
"It's pretty big so it's most likely gone to adulthood, so it appears to be doing quite well.
"It's just a unique individual."
