What is a real sea monster?

The blue whale is a true sea monster, with an average body length of about 26m, a record high of 33.5m and an average weight of 150 ton. Such a behemoth needs a lot of food. An adult blue whale consumes about 1 10,000 calories a day, which is equivalent to 1 ton krill, which is its staple food. The blue whale swam to the shallows and swallowed a mouthful of water and krill. Krill is filtered out by the tongue acting as a piston, forcing water to flow out through the baleen hanging on both sides of the upper jaw, like a big sieve. The tongue of a blue whale is more than 3 meters thick and weighs more than an elephant.

Blue whales roam the oceans of the world. According to statistics, there are 250,000 such beasts in the Southern Ocean alone. But in recent years, the relentless whaling industry has made the number of blue whales less and less, less than 1% of the total. It is difficult to determine the number of blue whales. At present, it is estimated that there are hundreds to1.65,438+0,000 in Antarctica. Whether this figure is correct or not, it has reached the lower limit of danger compared with the previous figure. Although whaling has been restricted in the last 50 years and 1967 has been banned, some people continue to kill blue whales commercially under the guise of scientific research.

Blue whales will migrate long distances. In summer, they live in polar waters and feed on a large number of krill near the edge of ice floes. When winter comes, they will migrate to warm equatorial waters for thousands of kilometers. It is reported that a blue whale can swim more than 3,000 kilometers in just 47 days. Such a long journey kept them away from the feeding base and did not eat for four months. Live on stored energy.

The gestation period of the blue whale is 1 1 month, while the newborn calf is about 7 meters long and weighs more than 2 tons. Breastfeeding more than half a ton a day will double your weight after one week. When the calf is weaned at about 6 months, its length will double, but it will take 4 to 5 years to reach sexual maturity and full development.

Blue whales enough to visit the world's oceans alone or in pairs can live to 120 years old. Although they live alone, they have advanced ultra-long-distance communication methods, which can emit low-frequency and high-intensity sounds. The recorded audio frequency is 1.80 dB, which is the maximum noise generated by sports, exceeding the noise generated by a jet plane. The sound can last for 30 seconds and can be heard by other blue whales 16 10 km away.

Blue whales have been the largest and heaviest animals in the world since ancient times. It looks like a black hill when it appears on the sea. Dinosaurs used to be giants on the earth, the largest being 25 meters long and weighing nearly 50 tons, but compared with blue whales, they looked very small. The largest blue whale captured by humans is 34.6m long and weighs 170 tons, which is equivalent to 27 elephants or 150 cattle. It takes as many as 43 cars to pull this blue whale with a 4-ton truck.

The blue whale is also a unique strongman in the animal kingdom. A blue whale can generate1250kw of electricity at a speed of 28km per hour, which is equivalent to the pulling force of a medium-sized locomotive. Once, a blue whale towed a 27m-long whaling speedboat for eight and a half hours, with an average speed of 9000m/h. At that time, the speedboat retreated at full speed, but it was still pulled forward by 74,000m.

Blue whales are gentle and like to eat tiny zooplankton, especially krill. It is a great trend for blue whales to open their huge mouths when eating, allowing seawater and zooplankton to flood in together. Then, once its mouth is closed, seawater is discharged from its tentacles, and the filtered animal can be swallowed. The blue whale has a big appetite. It can eat 1 ton krill every meal, 4 ~ 5 tons a day. It's really the champion of eating.

Blue whales are mammals that breathe with their lungs, and they need to come out to breathe every 10 ~ 15 minutes. When the blue whale comes out of the water, the carbon dioxide in the lungs is first discharged from the nostrils and then inhaled. The hot and powerful carbon dioxide exhaust gas discharged from the nostrils, accompanied by huge screams, also swept the nearby seawater out of the water surface, with a height of about 10m, so a spectacular white fog column appeared on the sea surface.

The females of blue whales are bigger than males, and the southern blue whales are bigger than the northern blue whales. Seen from above, the kiss is wide and flat. The dorsal fin is small, about 0.4m high, and 1/4 is at the back of the body. The flippers are small, accounting for 15% of the body length. The caudal fin is 1/3 to 1/4 in length, and the trailing edge is straight. There are 55 ~ 88 puncture grooves, the longest of which can reach the navel. 270 ~ 395 whiskers per side. The back of the body is dark gray-blue, the abdomen is slightly light, and the mouth must be black.

Blue whales are different from other kinds of whales. They are short and strong, while the vertebral body of blue whales is very long and looks like it has been elongated. The head is flat and U-shaped, and the pores from the upper lip to the back have obvious ridges. There are dense baleen plates at the front end of the mouth, and about 300 baleen plates (about 1m long) hang down from the upper jaw and pass through the mouth for about half a meter. 60 ~ 90 grooves (called abdominal folds) are parallel to the body along the throat. These folds are used to discharge seawater that has been swallowed in large quantities (see the section on "predation").

The dorsal fin of the blue whale is so small that it can only be seen briefly when diving. The shape of dorsal fin varies from individual to individual; Some fins have only one protrusion just visible, while others are very eye-catching and sickle-shaped. The dorsal fin is located about three-quarters of the body length. When reaching the surface to breathe, blue whales lift their shoulders and stomata off the water to a greater extent than other large whales (such as fin whales and pomfret). This can usually be used as a useful clue to identify marine species. When breathing, if it is calm, the spectacular vertical water column (up to 12m, generally 9m) ejected by the blue whale can be seen thousands of meters away. The vital capacity of the blue whale is 5000 liters.

The fin foot of a blue whale is 3-4 meters long. The top is gray and the narrow side is white. The bottom is all white. The head and caudal fin are generally gray. But the back and sometimes flippers are usually variegated. The degree of variegated color varies from person to person, and the difference is obvious. Some may be gray all over, while others are dark blue. Gray and black are quite mixed together.

When blue whales interact with other whales, they can sprint at a speed of 50 km/h (30 mph), but usually swim at a speed of 20 km/h (12 mph). Slow down to 5km/h(3mph) when eating. Blue whales in the North Atlantic and the North Pacific lift their tail fins when diving, but most other blue whales don't.

Taxonomically, blue whales belong to mammals, cetaceans, fin whales and fin whales. The blue whale is huge and fat, and it is one of the first targets to be killed. So their number is declining, and the existing number is only 200,000. Over the years, countries all over the world have been competing to hunt in the ocean, and now blue whales with a body length of more than 25m are rare. In addition, the fishing of krill has greatly affected the foraging activities of blue whales. According to statistics, there were about 300,000 blue whales in the world half a century ago. To 1974, there are still 25,000, and now there are only about 2,000 left. Although the number of blue whales killed every year has been limited internationally since 1932, the prospect of this world's largest animal is still very dangerous.

The whole body surface of the blue whale is light blue or mouse gray, with thin stripes on the back, white spots on the chest and more than 20 folds, and the abdomen is covered with folds all the way to the navel with ochre spots. Female animals have cleavage on both sides of the reproductive opening with slender nipples inside. The head is small and flat, with two injection holes on the top of the head, a wide mouth, no teeth in the mouth, a wide upper jaw, and an arc-shaped upward projection. There are 300-400 black whiskers on each side, which are 90-110cm long and 50-60cm wide. A large amount of earwax accumulates in the eardrum every year, and its age can be judged according to its thickness.

It also has a white callus on its upper jaw, which used to be a place for long hair. Later, the hair degenerated, leaving a warty vegetation and becoming a breeding ground for parasites. Because this callus is different for each individual, just like wearing a hat with a different shape, different individuals can be distinguished accordingly. The dorsal fin is very short, the length is less than 1.5 of the body length, and the flipper is not too long, about 4 meters, with four toes, no wavy notch at the back edge, and the tail is wide and flat. The whole body is streamlined and looks like a razor, so it is also called "razor whale".

The blue whale is full of treasures, and its fat can be used to make soap; Whale meat is delicious and nutritious; Whale bone can extract glue; Whale liver contains a lot of vitamins; Blood and viscera are high-quality fertilizers. Therefore, blue whales have been repeatedly killed by humans. At present, the number of blue whales is declining sharply, which is almost on the verge of extinction.

Blue whales feed on plankton, mainly krill. A blue whale consumes 2 ~ 4t food every day. The swimming speed is 2 ~ 6 km/h when feeding, 5 ~ 33 km when migrating, and the maximum forced speed is 20 ~ 48 km per hour. General 10 ~ 20 dive is followed by a deep dive. Shallow dive interval 12 ~ 20 seconds, deep dive sustainable 10 ~ 30 minutes. The spray column is narrow and straight, with a height of 6 ~ 12m. The blue whale is sexually mature at the age of 10. Northern blue whales breed and mate in late autumn and early winter. The southern hemisphere mates in the south in winter, with the peak in July. The reproductive period between the northern and southern hemispheres is half a year apart. The gestation period is 10 ~ 1 1 month. The calf is 6 ~ 7 meters long and weighs about 6 tons. The lactation period is half a year, and the weaning time can reach 16m. The highest age is estimated to be between 30 and 80-90.

Blue whales only prey on krill, and the plankton eaten by blue whales belong to different species according to different marine areas. In the North Atlantic, northern krill is the main food of blue whales.

Blue whales usually prey on the densest krill they can find, which means that blue whales need to feed in deep water (1100m or more) during the day and can only feed on the surface at night. The diving time of blue whales foraging is generally 10 minute. It is not unusual to dive for 20 minutes, and the longest diving time is 36 minutes (Sears, 1998). In the process of hunting, blue whales swallow a large group of krill at a time and a lot of seawater at the same time. Then squeeze the abdominal cavity and tongue, and squeeze the seawater out through the baleen. When the seawater in the mouth is completely discharged, the blue whale will swallow the remaining krill that cannot pass through the baleen whale board.

Krill is the most abundant animal in the world, widely distributed in the Arctic and Antarctic waters. It is because there is such a rich food and there is no limit to support weight that blue whales can develop so much. Every day, it spends most of its time swimming in dense plankton. The two rows of plate-like tentacles on its mouth are like a sieve, and its belly has many folds like accordion bellows, which can be expanded and contracted, so that it can swallow seawater and krill together, and then when its mouth is closed, seawater is discharged from the tentacles, filtering out shrimp and fish and swallowing them. Blue whales eat other shrimps, small fish, jellyfish, diatoms and various plankton. In contrast, blue whales living in northern waters are smaller than those living in waters near Antarctica, which is generally considered to be closely related to the types and quantity of their food.

Most of the bays inhabited by blue whales are flooded with extremely rich organic matter in the river water on the landing land, which makes the water quality very fertile and promotes the massive reproduction of plankton. The dense plankton attracted a large group of krill, and their bodies shone blue like diamonds. Incredibly, the blue whale, a super-large animal, actually feeds on krill, a tiny animal. Its stomach is divided into four parts. The first stomach is formed by esophageal dilatation, so it eats a lot. It can swallow 2 million krill at a time and eat 4000 ~ 8000 kilograms every day. If the food in its stomach is less than 2000 kilograms, it will feel hungry.

Although blue whales live in the sea, like other mammals, they breathe with their lungs, which weigh more than 65,438+0,000 kilograms and can hold more than 65,438+0,000 liters of air. Such a large lung capacity greatly reduces the number of breaths, and only comes out to breathe once every 10 ~ 15 minutes. When breathing, carbon dioxide and other waste gases in the lungs are discharged from the body through the nostrils, and then fresh oxygen is inhaled. Whenever its head comes out of the water to breathe, it will expel carbon dioxide and other waste gases from its body. When this powerful hot airflow rushes out of its nostrils, the jet height can reach about 10m, and it will also roll the nearby seawater out of the sea surface, and a spectacular water column will appear on the blue sea surface. From a distance, it looks like a fountain on the sea, and it also makes a loud sound like a train whistle, which is called "tidal rapids". People can determine the position of the blue whale according to the sound it makes when breathing and the height and shape of the jet.

Generally, whales don't lift their tails before diving, but blue whales always put their tails out of the water before diving, sometimes jumping out of the water very high, and then quickly diving into the water for 30 ~ 40m to find food. Usually, I also like to draw water with the tail fin, which is a versatile and versatile pastime. It may be playing a game, attracting the attention of its peers, or removing parasites from its skin.

Blue whales are distributed all over the world, with the most effective amount in Antarctic waters, mainly distributed in temperate and cold seas with water temperature of 5 ~ 20℃. Some whales have visited the Yellow Sea and the waters of Taiwan Province Province. Blue whale is one of the most important economic species and contains a lot of fat. Internationally, it is stipulated that the oil production of blue whales should be used as the conversion unit, that is, 1 blue whales = 2 fin whales = 2.5 humpback whales = 6 fin whales. Since modern whaling began, blue whales have been caught indiscriminately. During the peak period of 1930 ~ 3 1, nearly 30,000 blue whales were killed worldwide. 1966, the international whaling commission declared the blue whale as a protected object. Before the development, there were at least 200,000 blue whales, and now it is estimated that there are at most13,000 blue whales. According to the statistical report published by the International Whaling Commission 1989, there are only 200 ~ 453 blue whales. This is based on an eight-year survey in the southern hemisphere, which is on the verge of extinction.

Blue whales are distributed in the oceans of the northern and southern hemispheres from the South Pole to the North Pole, especially near the South Pole, but they are rare in tropical waters. In China, it is distributed in the Yellow Sea, the East China Sea and the South China Sea, including the waters in the south and southwest of Taiwan Province Province. Despite its huge size, it usually moves slowly and often stands still, but it can rise and fall freely in the water and its tail swings flexibly. It is not only the driving force for progress, but also acts as a rudder, with a speed of 28 kilometers per hour.

Since whaling was banned, the number of blue whales in the world has remained basically the same, about 3,000 to 4,000. Since the establishment of the Red List of Endangered Species, the blue whale has been listed as an endangered species on the Red List. There are about 2,000 blue whales in the northeastern Pacific Ocean, which are concentrated between Alaska and Costa Rica, but they are common in California in summer. In the long run, this number is the hope of increasing the number of blue whales. Sometimes they drift to the northwest Pacific; It is recorded between kamchatka peninsula and the northern end of Japan.

The population of southern ocean blue whale is between 750- 1200, and the migration mode of this population is not well understood. They may be different from the uncertain people who often appear on the northeast coast of Sri Lanka. Some blue whales in the Southern Ocean population are close to the east coast of the South Pacific. In Chile, people found blue whales gathering on the coast of Lu Zhi Island for food, so the Chilean Whale Conservation Center, with the support of the Chilean navy, conducted extensive research and protection on them.

There are two populations of blue whales living in the North Atlantic. The first one is located in Greenland, Newfoundland, Nova Scotia and St. Lawrence Bay. It is estimated that there are about 500 heads. The second one is farther east, in the Azores in spring and in Iceland in July and August. It is speculated that whales move between these two volcanic islands along the mid-Atlantic ridge. In addition to Iceland, although extremely rare, blue whales can also be found in Svalbard and Jan Mayen. Scientists don't know where these blue whales spend the winter. The population of the whole North Atlantic is between 600 and 1500.

Humans pose a threat to the recovery of the blue whale population. Polychlorinated biphenyls can accumulate in the blood of blue whales, leading to poisoning and premature death. At the same time, the noise brought by the increasing ocean transportation masks the sound of the blue whale, making it difficult for the blue whale to find a mate.

Blue whales begin to mate after autumn and continue until the end of winter. We know nothing about mating behavior and breeding grounds. Females give birth every 2 ~ 3 years, usually in the early winter after 10 ~ 12 months of pregnancy. This calf weighs about 2.5 tons and is about 7 meters long. About six months later, the calf was weaned and its length doubled. Blue whales generally reach sexual maturity at the age of 8 ~ 10, when the males are at least 20m long (longer in the southern hemisphere). The female is relatively large and sexually mature at about 5 years old. At this time, the body length is about 21m.

Scientists estimate that the life span of blue whales is at least 80 years; However, since individual records cannot be traced back to the whaling era, it will take many years to determine the exact life span of whales. The longest recorded research on a single individual was conducted in the Northeast Pacific for 34 years (Sears 1998 report). The natural enemy of the blue whale is the killer whale. Calambokidis et al. (1990) found that 25% of adult blue whales have scars left by killer whale attacks. However, there is no exact data on the death rate caused by the attack.

It is rare for a blue whale to run aground. Because of its special group structure, we have never heard of the stranding of blue whales. But when the grounding does happen, it will attract much attention. 1920, a blue whale ran aground on the beach of Lewis Island, Hebrides Island outside Scotland. It was hit on the head by a whaling ship, but the harpoon didn't explode. Like other animals, blue whales instinctively keep breathing at all costs. Stranding can keep it from being bored to death. Two whale bones standing on the roadside of Luis Island attracted a large number of tourists.

Although some people have seen 50 ~ 60 blue whales move in groups, they rarely form groups, most of them are lonely, or only 2 ~ 3 of them move together. Amphibious blue whales are very harmonious with each other, swimming, diving, foraging and breathing together, just like mandarin ducks, inseparable, often leaving a wide waterway behind them. Three blue whales get together, mostly females and a calf, close together, followed by males, about 3 meters apart.

Blue whales breed in winter, and females are usually born every two years. Pregnancy 10 ~ 12 months, each fetus only gives birth to 1 child. The newborn baby is 6-8 meters long and weighs about 6000 kilograms. In order to prevent suffocation, the female must lift the cub out of the water to take the first breath of air, and then she can breathe by herself. A pair of nipples of female animals grow on both sides of reproductive foramen, and swim in the upper layer of seawater when breastfeeding, and the cubs follow closely below the tail of female animals. Because the larvae have no movable lips, they can't hold their nipples to suck milk. Female animals directly spray milk into their mouths by virtue of muscle contraction, which is also a good adaptation to their main activities in water. Blue whale's milk is rich in nutrition, in which the fat content is 10 times that of milk, and the milk that young whales suck every day is above 1000 kg, so it develops rapidly. After 8 months, it can be increased to 15m, and its weight can be increased to 23000 kg, so you can eat all kinds of plankton with your own mouth. From two and a half to three years old, the body length can exceed 20 m, the age of sexual maturity is about 8 ~ 10 years old, the life expectancy is generally over 50 years old, and the maximum life expectancy is 90 ~ 100 years old.

The blue whale is the loudest animal in the world. Cummings and Thompson (197 1 year) and Richardson et al. (1995) said that by measuring the reference pressure of the blue whale at one millipascal, the sound of the blue whale can reach 155 ~ 188 decibel at the sound source. Even considering the different impedances and standard reference pressures of water and air, the equivalent sound range in air is still 89 ~ 122 dB.

In contrast, the sound of a pneumatic drill is about 100 decibel. But humans may not realize that the blue whale is the loudest animal. The fundamental frequency of all blue whale populations is 10 ~ 40 Hz, and the lowest frequency that humans can detect is 20 Hz. The sound duration of the blue whale is 10 ~ 30 seconds. According to records, the sound of blue whales off the coast of Sri Lanka repeatedly sings a four-note "song", which lasts for two minutes at a time, reminding people of the song of humpback whales. The researchers believe that this phenomenon may be unique to pygmy subspecies because it has not been seen in other populations.

Blue whales are not easy to kill and preserve. The speed and strength of blue whales mean that they are usually not the target of early whalers, and they choose to kill sperm whales and right whales. When the number of these two whales decreased, whalers chose to kill more baleen whales, including blue whales. 1864, Swende, Norway Foyne assembled his boat with a harpoon specially designed to catch big whales. Although it was troublesome at first, this method soon became popular. /kloc-At the end of 0/9, the number of blue whales in the North Atlantic began to decrease.

Worldwide, the killing of blue whales has increased rapidly. By 1925, the United States, Britain and Japan followed Norway and joined the ranks of killing blue whales. They kill blue whales with "whaling ships" and then hang them on huge "factory ships" for processing. 1930, 4 1 ship * * * slaughtered 28,325 blue whales. At the end of World War II, the blue whale population was close to extinction, and 1946 introduced international whale trading quota for the first time. These quotas are invalid because the agreement does not take into account the differences between different species. Rare species will be killed like more species. By AD 1960, the International Whaling Commission began to ban the killing of blue whales. By this time, 350,000 blue whales have been killed, and the population in the world has decreased to less than 1% 0 years ago.

Due to the long-term hunting of human beings, the number of blue whales has dropped from hundreds of thousands to only about 2,000. Because blue whales like to live alone, their range of activities is extremely wide, and the number of blue whales is very small, so it is extremely difficult for them to breed when they meet their spouses. Some people worry that the blue whale will inevitably become extinct.