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ALL ABOUT WHALES!
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BLUE WHALE
Balaenoptera musculus		 Blue Whale Printout
Blue Whale Connect-the-Dots




GENERAL DESCRIPTION
The blue whale is the largest animal that ever lived on Earth. It is also the loudest animal on Earth. These enormous mammals eat tiny organisms, like plankton and krill, which they sieve through baleen. They live in pods (small groups). These gray-blue whales have 2 blowholes and a 2-14 inch (5-30 cm) thick layer of blubber.

Blue whales are rorqual whales, whales that have pleated throat grooves that allow their throat to expand during the huge intake of water during filter feeding. Blue whales have 50-70 throat grooves that run from the throat to mid-body.

Blue Whale


SIZE
Blue whales grow to be about 80 feet (25 m) long on average, weighing about 120 tons (109 tonnes). The largest specimen found was a female 94 feet (29 m) long weighing more 174 tons (158 tonnes). The females are larger than males, as with all baleen whales. The largest of the blue whales (150 tons) has a heart that weighs about 1,000 pounds (450 kg) and has 14,000 pounds (6,400 kg) of blood circulating in its body. The heart is about the size of a Volkswagon bug car. A human could crawl through the aorta (a major blood vessel).

A Comparison of the Size of the Blue Whale and Other Interesting Animals

LOUDNESS
Blue whales are the loudest animals on Earth! Their call reaches levels up to 188 decibels. This low-frequency whistle can be heard for hundreds of miles. The blue whale is louder than a jet, which reaches only 140 decibels! Human shouting is 70 decibels; sounds over 120 decibels are painful to human ears.

Click here to hear a blue whale call (recorded by the NOAA).

SKIN, SHAPE AND FINS
The blue whale's skin is usually blue-gray with white-gray spots. The underbelly has brown, yellow, or gray specks. During the winter in cold waters, diatoms stick to the underbelly, giving it a yellow to silver- to sulfur-colored sheen; they are sometimes called "sulfur bottom."

They have a very small, falcate (sickle-shaped) dorsal fin that is located near the flukes (tail). Blue whales have long, thin flippers 8 feet long (2.4 m) and flukes that are 25 feet (7.6 m) wide.

DIET AND BALEEN
Blue whales (like all baleen whales) are seasonal feeders and carnivores that filter feed tiny crustaceans (krill, copepods, etc.), plankton, and small fish from the water. They are gulpers, filter feeders that alternatively swim then gulp a mouthful of plankton or fish - they lunge into dense groups of small sea organisms (krill or tiny fish) with an open mouth. 50 to 70 throat pleats allow the throat to expand a great deal, forming a gular pouch. The water is then forced through the baleen plates hanging from the upper jaw. The baleen catches the food, acting like a sieve.

The blue whale has about 320 pairs of black baleen plates with dark gray bristles in the blue whale's jaws. They are about 39 inches long (1 m), 21 inches wide (53 cm), and weigh 200 pounds (90 kg). The tongue weighs 4 tons (3.8 tonnes).

An average-sized blue whale will eat 2,000-9,000 pounds (900-4100 kg) of plankton each day during the summer feeding season in cold, arctic waters ( about 120 days).

The Food Chain of a Blue Whale

Blue whale
Zooplankton
Phytoplankton

SOCIAL GROUPS
Blue whales live individually or in very small pods (groups). They frequently swim in pairs.

DIVING
Blue whales can dive for up to an hour, going to a depth of 350 feet (105 m).

SPOUTING - BREATHING
Blue whales breathe air at the surface of the water through 2 blowholes located near the top of the head. They spout (breathe) about 1-4 times per minute at rest, and 5-12 times per minutes after a deep dive. Their blow is a single stream that rises 40-50 feet (12-15 m) above the surface of the water.

SPEED
Blue whales are very fast swimmers; they normally swim 3-20 mph (4.8-32 kph), but can go up to 24-30 mph (38-48 kph) in bursts when in danger. Feeding speeds are slower, about 1-4 mph (1.6-6.2 kph).

VOCALIZATION
Blue whales emit very loud, highly structured, repetitive low-frequency sounds that can travel for many miles underwater. They are probably the loudest animals alive, louder than a jet engine. These songs may be used for locating large masses of krill (tiny crustaceans that they eat) and for communicating with other blue whales, especially in order to attract and find mates

HABITAT AND RANGE
Blue whales live at the surface of the ocean and are found in all the oceans of the world.



REPRODUCTION
Blue whale breeding occurs mostly in the winter to early spring while near the surface and in warm waters. The gestation period is about 11-12 months and the calf is born tail first (this is normal for cetaceans) and near the surface in warm, shallow waters. The newborn instinctively swims to the surface within 10 seconds for its first breath; it is helped by its mother, using her flippers. Within 30 minutes of its birth the baby whale can swim. The newborn calf is about 25 feet long (7.6 m) and weighs about 6-8 tons (5.4-7.3 tonnes). Twins are extremely rare (about 1% of births); there is almost always one calf. The baby is nurtured with its mother's fat-laden milk (it is 40-50% fat) and is weaned in about 7-8 months. Calves drink 50-200 pounds (23-90 kg) of milk each day. The mother and calf may stay together for a year or longer, until the calf is about 45 feet long (13 m). Blue whales reach maturity at 10-15 years.

PREDATORS
Orca Packs of killer whales (orcas) have been known to attack and kill young blue whales. Man also hunted blue whales until the International Whaling Commission declared them to be a protected species in 1966 because of a huge decrease in their population.

LIFE SPAN
Blue whales have a life expectancy of 35-40 years.

POPULATION COUNT
It is estimated that there are about 10,000-14,000 blue whales world-wide. Blue whales are an endangered species. These whales (and many other large whales) were over-hunted for many years, since their meat, oil, and other body parts are very valuable. Since whale hunting has decreased in the last few decades, their populations are starting to recover.

CLASSIFICATION
Blue whales (Balaenoptera musculus) are baleen whales (Suborder Mysticeti). They are one of 76 cetacean species, and are marine mammals.

Kingdom Animalia (animals)
Phylum Chordata (vertebrates)
Class Mammalia (mammals)
Order Cetacea (whales and dolphins)
Suborder Mysticeti (baleen whales)
Family Balaenopteridae
Genus Balaenoptera
Species musculus
Subspecies B.m. intermedia (from the southern hemisphere), B.m. musculus (from the northern hemisphere in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans), and B.m. brevicauda (the pygmy blue whale; Yochem and Leatherwood 1985).


BLUE WHALE ACTIVITIES
A K-3 level print-out about blue whales.

A Blue Whale quiz to print out.

A first grade addition activity. Solve the 1-digit addition problems, then do letter substitutions to answer a whale question.

A first grade subtraction activity. Solve the 1-digit subtraction problems, then do letter substitutions to answer a whale question.

A Blue whale word hunt activity - For second and third graders.



Mystery Whale Connect-the-Dots
Connect the dots, then figure out what type of whale you have drawn.		 blue whale wordsearch

Blue Whale Wordsearch Puzzle
Find the blue whale words in the wordsearch puzzle, then use the extra letters to find the secret word: "BIGGEST ANIMAL." Or go to the answers. Or go to a pdf of the puzzle and the answers.


BLUE WHALE LINKS
The loudest animal on Earth, the Blue Whale.
The Whale-watching web


Information Sheets About Whales
(and other cetaceans)

Just click on a cetacean's name to go to that information sheet.

BELUGA WHALE

BLUE WHALE

BOTTLENOSE DOLPHIN

BOWHEAD WHALE

GRAY WHALE

HUMPBACK WHALE

KILLER WHALE

MINKE WHALE

NARWHAL

ORCA

RIGHT WHALES

SPERM WHALE


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