DAVAO CITY - Over 40 kilos of plastic trash were recovered from the stomach of a dead whale in the town of Mabini at the Compostela Valley.

The Cuvier's beaked whale found last Friday was subjected by Darrel Blatchley, founder of the D'Bone Collector Museum, to a necropsy which revealed that its belly was filled with over 16 pieces of sacks, grocery bags, and other garbage.

Blatchley said the whale died because of dehydration and starvation due to plastic ingestion.

Blatchley appealed to the public to refrain from throwing plastic trash in waterways since these could be eaten by animals.

"Every single river, every single canal goes directly to the ocean. So everything from small whales and dolphins, even the sea turtles are affected by this, as well as humans. We are eating the food that comes out of that ocean. So we're basically throwing our own garbage into our food source," he said.

Just this year, 3 whales and dolphins were found dead along the Davao gulf after ingesting plastic garbage.