WATCH: Rescue Crews Try Save Beached Baby Humpback Whale In Australia

A baby humpback whale was euthanized Monday after it was stranded on Moreton Island, off the coast of Brisbane, Australia. Ranger in charge Terry Christensen said the baby whale, 4 meters (about 13 feet) long, was beached at Bulwer Wrecks on the northwestern side of the Moreton Island, according to reports.

When the baby whale was spotted, the rangers and the Moreton Bay Marine Park staff tried keeping the calf wet, according to 7 News Brisbane. The rescue team wanted to keep it wet until the tide came in enough to refloat it. However, the calf was soon euthanized following the Sea World veterinary advice to prevent the baby whale from suffering, 9news.com.au reported.

When a humpback whale calf is born, it is between 10 and 15 feet in length and it may weigh up to 1 ton. It's the mother who brings the calf to the surface of the water for its first breath of air. The calf then begins learning to swim. However, during the learning stage, the humpback whale calf is vulnerable to predators and the male humpback whales can also be dangerous as they try to mate with its mother.

Read: Gigantic Humpback Whales Spotted By New Yorkers Near Statue Of Liberty

A baby humpback whale consumes more than 200 liters of milk per day. The mother of a feeding calf would stay underwater and the calf would return to the surface every few minutes to breathe.

In Brisbane, the prime whale watching season runs from June to November. The Moreton Bay Marine Park is an attractive destination for whale watching due to its diversity. Along with the whales, viewers get to see a mixture of reefs and seagrass drawing in a wide array of other marine life. In Marine Park, you can also see large sea turtles and pods of dolphins.

The first humpback whales of the season were spotted in May off the Gold Coast, which is a coastal city in Queensland, approximately 41 miles south-southeast of Brisbane. The whales were spotted five days before the beginning of the official whale-watching season, a report said.

Read: Cameras On Humpback Whales Give A Glimpse Of Marine Mammal Behavior In Antarctica

A female humpback whale and her mature calf were seen when the crew of a Gold Coast-based tourist boat was three nautical miles off the coast. A marine biologist from the Spirit of Gold Coast, Zara King, said: "They were just calmly swimming north and as we approached they got really active and started breaching."

"We got a double breach... whole bodies out of the water," she added.

King indicated a record 27,000 whales were expected to migrate this season, based on previous estimates. "There's been about an 11 per cent increase each year," she said.

Australian government ended all commercial whaling in 1978 with the closure of the Cheynes Beach Whaling Company, in Western Australia. In 1979, the country adopted an anti-whaling policy that banned whaling in Australian waters. The government also started focusing on working toward the conservation of whales.